Sydney FC Head Coach Ufuk Talay believes five games against teams above them in the ladder is an advantage heading into the final stages of their Isuzu-UTE A-League campaign.
The Sky Blues face a busy period of eight games in just over a month with six of those in the A-League, starting with Melbourne City at home this Saturday, set to determine their final position.
“[It’s a] Massive fight coming up, the boys are in a good place, I think squad wise only missing a couple of players with Gurdy [Aaron] and Kyle [Shaw] and everyone else is available which is great.
“Socceroos [Anthony Caceres and Alex Grant] fly in this [Thursday] morning, they will go home, rest and they’ll be back in with the group tomorrow.
“Everything is in our hands now to push even further in the A-League and finish with a good place in finals football,” he said.
“We worked quite hard training in this international break knowing that we’ve got very important games coming up.”
Sydney FC will be without Captain Rhyan Grant who is suspended following his 5th yellow card of the season in the last match against Wellington Phoenix, however centre half Alex Popovic returns to the squad from a groin injury.
Brazilian star Douglas Costa is also in line for a start following his spell on the bench against the Nix.
“I don’t think he definitely needed a break,” Talay continued. “I thought we were managing him through games, you notice there’s times where we take him off early within games around the 60th to 70th minute or his gone to the 80th.
“Against Wellington we used him for 45 minutes in the second half and he’s a very important player for us that we want to keep on the park.
“Having a Douglas Costa available for 60 to 70 minutes is very important to our team.”
After the City clash the Sky Blues will gear up for an away match in Adelaide on the 5th of April, before first-leg fixture against the Lion City Sailors, wrapping up the return home fixture at Sydney Football Stadium on April 16th.
