Melbourne Victory star Marcos Flores said the chance to work with two-time Hyundai A-League championship-winning coach Ange Postecoglou was one of the main reasons for his return to Australia.
Melbourne Victory star Marcos Flores said the chance to work with two-time Hyundai A-League championship-winning coach Ange Postecoglou was one of the main reasons for his return to Australia.
Flores said he was in awe of Postecoglou’s Brisbane side during his spell with Adelaide United in 2010/11, and wanted to be a part of the master coach’s plans for Victory.
“I have a lot of respect (for Postecoglou), and he’s one of the important reasons why I came to the club,” Flores said after training at Gosch’s Paddock on Thursday.
“I was so jealous when I saw him in Brisbane, when I was playing in Adelaide.
“I wanted to be under him, to be part of one philosophy – the way he drives the team and the way he wants to play.
“I’m really proud to be here.”
Victory sit second in the A-League table and have lost just once in their past eight games as they prepare for their third derby showdown of the season against Melbourne Heart, at Etihad Stadium on Saturday night.
Flores said the squad is confident they can deliver the goods at the business end of the season, and declared that nothing less than an A-League title will satisfy the club.
“I believe in my dream – I came to Melbourne Victory to be champions. Not to be second, not to be third. I want to be the champion. Every day I’m working for that,” he said.
“We are improving. We are one team, if you see from the first weeks, (who) make steps forward every weekend. Even if a couple of weeks, we didn’t get the three points, we were improving, improving, improving.”
Flores made a slow start to his time at Victory, but the Argentine – who has two goals from his past four games – was philosophical when asked about the time it took him to settle in.
“When you change for beautiful things, when you change the philosophy, when you want to switch the passion of everyone – it’s not easy,” he said.
“For every person in this world, when you want to change your routine, it takes time.
“Everyone thought at the start of the season we’d score seven goals in every game, but slowly, slowly, we get to show we are a good team.”
