Melbourne Victory head coach Marco Kurz was unhappy with his side’s performance in a 3-2 loss to the Central Coast Mariners.
Matt Simon scored two stoppage-time penalties in Gosford on Sunday to give the Mariners their first win over Victory since 2013.
Kristijan Dobras’ opener had been cancelled out by Jordan Murray before a Kye Rowles own goal put Victory – which squandered numerous first-half chances – back ahead, but Central Coast struck late.
Speaking at his post-match news conference, Kurz discussed his team’s display and the late spot-kicks.
on late emotion…
“I think it’s part of a football game. Everybody wants to win. I think if you’re winning 2-1 and you concede two penalties in overtime, it’s normal that you have some emotions and that was part of the game today and we lost the game at the end of second-half additional time.”
on penalties…
“You can discuss the penalty decisions. The handball rule is always hard, it’s not clear, I think it’s a duel and Donks (James Donachie) touched the ball but if you have to give a penalty, it’s up to the refs or more to the VAR because the VAR is in my opinion the main referee here and the second one, it wasn’t a penalty what I saw, but we have to respect the decision from the ref.”
on the game…
“I think we started well. I wasn’t agreeing with the performance after 25 minutes, I think we had in the first half 200 per cent chances to score the second goal, but we didn’t. In the second half as well, we had a couple of good moments, but we played not well over the full time. At the end, if you’re winning 2-1, we must be smarter, cleverer, to bring the game home with the three points, but we didn’t and that’s the reason that we are really disappointed.”
