Post-match reaction: Popovic

Melbourne Victory Head Coach Tony Popovic felt his side struggled with the final pass in Saturday’s dramatic 1-1 draw with Adelaide United.

Nick D’Agostino’s spectacular 84th-minute strike was cancelled out by Craig Goodwin in additional time at AAMI Park.

Isaias was sent off after the goals, with Victory now unbeaten in six games in all competitions and sitting a point clear atop the Isuzu UTE A-League.

Speaking at his post-match news conference, Popovic discussed the game and his side’s absences – both due to injuries and COVID.

on the finish…
“It was a bit crazy, wasn’t it? It was end to end and that’s how the game panned out. We scored a wonderful goal, they scored a nice finish as well off the cross and in between I thought in large parts we were very good. I thought we played good first half, just missed a goal in the first half, sometimes it was a final pass or decision, a lot of young boys just getting experience, but a lot of good play, a lot of good play.”

on only having one shot on target…
“When you hit the target, you’ve got a better chance of scoring of course. You can look at it in many different ways, but we had a good chance in the first half that they blocked, when Nick was with the keeper, the defender’s come across, a great chance. It was more in the final third, the last pass let us down, a lot of good openings, a lot of good football to get to there, that’s maybe a little bit of a lack of experience from players, but the more they get in those areas, the better they’ll get.”

on the week…
“A lot’s been happening over the last week, it’s not just the last few days. We have some injuries, we have some players that are following the COVID protocols so we have a large number of players unavailable, but I don’t want to focus on that. We played the game tonight, we played at home, I thought we had a good performance, we pressed well, we played well, we just didn’t take advantage of those good moments that we had to get the lead when I thought we should’ve.”

on injured trio Chris Ikonomidis, Jason Davidson and Matt Spiranovic…
“They’re getting better, they’re getting better. In a week they might all be closer to playing which is a real positive.”

on Jay Barnett…
“Excellent. I thought he did very, very well, very well. And he was chosen to play left-back, he wasn’t there because the players were out.”