Being a goal down heading into Saturday’s Semi Final second leg, Joel King believes his side have nothing to lose with a sold out Industree Group Stadium ready to will the home side onto victory.
The yellow and navy have just recently lifted the Premiers Plate and AFC Cup and with all the noise that is coming from Gosford currently, King believes his Sydney FC side can spoil the party on Saturday.
“This is a game where we have nothing to lose being a goal down so we have to switch on from the start and hopefully get an early goal.
‘We’re ready to take it to the 120 minutes and even penalties if it goes that way so the boys are really excited for the game,” King said.
“All the boys will be looking forward to playing in front of their fans and our fans as we usually bring a big crowd to the Mariners matches and having them in full support will be good and create a good atmosphere.”
In the first leg, the Sky Blues played more than half of the second half a man light and then were reduced to nine with the dismissal of Corey Hollman due to a second yellow.
While playing with nine, Sydney managed to keep the free scoring Mariners at bay and limit them to very few half chances.
If King and his team mates can keep 11 on the pitch for the entire match, he believes they are in with a shot of upsetting the Mariners’ treble plans.
“To hold out with nine and have the score only be 2-1 was a big positive for us because this week we know that we can take it to them with 11.
“It’s disappointing and annoying when there are red cards in matches so we are sorta getting used to it now but it’s something you gotta deal with and can’t complain too much about.
“You just need to adapt to the situation and do what you can with it,” he added.
Having done the double over the Mariners this season, beating them 3-1 in Gosford and 2-0 at Allianz Stadium, the Sky Blues didn’t seem to hit the same levels in the first leg, losing 2-1.
With these results in the back of their minds, Joel King revealed the motivation that Ufuk Talay has been providing his players this week.
“We know we can beat them and we’ve done it this year but we can’t think like that.
“Uffy [Talay] spoke to us at the beginning of the week and said that the worst thing that happened to us was beating them twice this season and the best thing that happened was losing twice to Macarthur,” King said.
“We just gotta have the mindset where we focus on ourselves and worry about the performance and I think if we do that, we can be happy with however the result goes.”
Match Details
Central Coast Mariners v Sydney FC
Isuzu UTE A-League Semi Final Second Leg
Saturday 18th May 2024
Industree Group Stadium, Gosford, NSW
Kick Off: 7:45pm AEST
Gates Open: 6:15pm AEST
Broadcast Live: Paramount+ & 10Bold
