City Head Coach John van’t Schip isn’t expecting a similar showing from both sides to the FFA Cup Final as his side prepares for a massive top of the table encounter on Friday night.
City defeated Sydney to lift the FFA Cup trophy last Wednesday in front of over 18,000 fans at AAMI Park and the two foes will meet in Round 10 of the A-League at ANZ Stadium.
With plenty of motivation from the win, the Dutchman is positive his side can replicate the result but believes both sides will bring different qualities to the contest.
“It’s a big game,” he said.
“We beat them in the FFA Cup but it was a different game. This is a different game as well, first against second and we think that we can improve on our game that we had against them last week.
“We looked at how we played and we have seen a lot of thing we can do a lot better so we are going out there to play and do the things that we think is going to cause them problems and see how it works.
“For us now, we have to show that we can win against them in the league as well but of course it’s not as easy but we are full of confidence that we can get a result there.
“It’s about performing, improving and if we start playing better and better in the way that we want to, that has to result in winning a lot of games and of course this is one of them we want to win.
The team’s style has seen other Clubs use the media to criticise City’s aggressive style but this didn’t phase van’t Schip who believes his side have been taken out of context, saying they will not be changing the way they go about things.
“We want to be aggressive on the ball by playing attacking football and keeping the ball and creating a lot of chances,” he said.
“When we don’t have it, it’s about being aggressive on winning the ball back again. It’s not about kicking opponents, we want to get the ball back.
“We know we have players that are up for it, players that can play big games and deal well with emotions and this is another one.”
Van’t Schip also confirmed that Osama Malik will miss this week and possibly the next with a quad injury while the Head Coach expected Ivan Franjic to be fully fit for the contest after being rested from last week’s match.
City take on Sydney this Friday night at ANZ Stadium, kick-off 7.50pm. See the match on Fox Sports 505 and SBSVICELAND.
