Victory’s play has been defined by its pragmatism so far in 2019/20, with moments of incisiveness and verve more often than not delivered thanks to individual brilliance from players such as Robbie Kruse and Ola Toivonen more so than any tactical innovation.

For a club like Victory, whose fans pride themselves on the perception that their club plays an attacking and attractive brand of football, it was a bitter pill to swallow – especially when not accompanied by on-field success.

“I don’t want to talk about how a coach is coaching,” Di Pietro said. “But at Melbourne Victory, our members expect an entertaining brand of football and that’s what will bring us the results that we want as well if we’re playing football that’s taking on our opposition.

“It’s easy to make these statements, I really don’t want to get into playing styles at all, because there are factors that can affect a game plan on any given day. But yes, an entertaining take on the game, the brand of football is what our members and fans expect.”

Salvachúa, for his part, agreed.

“Firstly, I have to adapt to the players and adapt to the philosophy of the club,” the interim boss said. “That’s most important.”

“I know at this club is an important thing in Australia and always they try to get an attacking style, an attacking performance, an entertaining style for the members. This is what I trust in the squad and the players and I think we can do it.”

Victory in coming days expected to announce an agreement to bring favourite son Marco Rojas back to the club, with import Kristijan Dobras released to make way for the All White.

Victory CEO Trent Jacobs also confirmed that defender Corey Brown had agreed to a mutual termination of his contract with Victory, and flagged further manoeuvring in the January transfer window to come.

“We can confirm today, due to personal reasons, Corey Brown has departed the club by way of mutual termination,” Jacobs said. “We will be looking to improve our roster through the January transfer window, albeit at the moment we haven’t made any signing and final decisions.

“We assure our members and fans that our intentions are very clear for the remainder of the year. This decision as the chairman has said is about retaining results and we’ll look to put together the best roster for the remainder of the season to attain those results.”