Melbourne Victory head coach Jeff Hopkins took some positives from his team’s 0-0 Westfield W-League draw against Brisbane Roar.
Neither team was able to find a breakthrough at Epping Stadium, with Victory creating plenty of chances.
The result meant Victory took four points from a possible six against Brisbane this season and aspects of its performance on Saturday pleased Hopkins.
“We’ve definitely mentioned that. I think Brisbane are a good side and they’ll be up there at the end of the season and we need to understand that we were up against a very good side,” he said.
“We’ve already won in Brisbane and four out of six points is a good haul from the two games against them so we’ve got a number of positives out of the game and then take that to Perth with us because we’re coming into a run of three games that we’ve got to get points from.
“I’m confident there were enough signs from enough players to say that the next three games we can turn what we did into goalscoring opportunities and goals and turn those goals into points as well.”
Victory switched to a back three for its clash against Brisbane and while it had its moments, its execution in the attacking third let it down.
Hopkins was happy with the effort of his players while praising his defence and goalkeeper Casey Dumont.
“We changed things around a little bit from the last game, just changed the formation just for this week’s game just to mainly give us a few more options in the forwards, in the forward pocket, played an extra player up front and shifted our midfield around,” he said.
“In some aspects, it was better, we did have more forward options, but playing a new formation gave us a few problems as well, we weren’t really used to it.
“In general, I was really happy with the application of the players, the way we tried to make things work, especially in the second half although we were up against a very good side, we never stopped trying to go and win the game and although at times it turned out to be too much end to end for us, I was really, really proud of the application and the effort of the players.
“They tried to make it work, we flipped things around just for this week and unfortunately we didn’t get the three points, but we never stopped looking for it.
“I think I must say the way that we defended at times, sometimes with a lot of desperation, last-ditch tackles, our goalkeeper and our back three, every credit to them because as I say changing the formation we maybe got ourselves in a few positions we weren’t used to and the last-ditch tackles and desperation from a number of players was a highlight of our defending.”
