Melbourne Victory head coach Kevin Muscat praised Elvis Kamsoba’s contribution in a 3-2 comeback win over the Central Coast Mariners.
Kamsoba was lively after coming on at half-time with Victory trailing 2-0, setting up James Troisi’s goal as his side came from behind in the Hyundai A-League on Saturday.
A Ben Kennedy own goal and Kosta Barbarouses strike sealed Victory’s win in Gosford.
Speaking at his post-match news conference, Muscat discussed his side’s comeback, Kamsoba’s display and Terry Antonis’ performance at right-back.
On his thoughts at half-time…
“Naturally, at that point, the focus was not on the 45 minutes that just passed, it’s what do we do to get back into the game here, to give the players the best opportunity to do so? Without doubt, the players weren’t feeling great. That opportunity there, that 12-13 minutes is to refocus and reset. It’s not a position we want to be in, no doubt, 2-0 down, two free-kicks, but then in the second half the contribution from the collective was outstanding. There was a need to get the next goal in the game, the first goal of the second half, and as you could see, with some changes in personnel and structure, we dominated the second half and could’ve scored a few more.”
on Kamsoba…
“Credit to him, he’s got to be complimented on his contribution. He was outstanding. He was outstanding from the moment he stepped on right to the death there. The second goal, for him to stay out of the way of Ben Kennedy, not to get involved, a real big contribution and he seemed to lift the players around him. Kenny (Athiu) had a spark in his step and James Troisi was unplayable in the second half, when the chips were down he really dug deep and contributed unbelievably for his team.”
on Antonis at right-back…
“He was good. I thought he was very good. Defending is probably not something he enjoys the most. He had to put on a performance for his team, what was needed. We needed someone in there and Terry was best equipped to do it and he didn’t let anybody down. I thought he was outstanding. I don’t think Connor (Pain) got the other side of him once, such was his positioning. Terry is a clever player and we put him there because we knew he’d be able to adapt with his football intelligence and he done such a good job that we might keep him there.”
