After a convincing win in the Melbourne Derby, Melbourne Victory coach Kevin Muscat believes his side still has room for improvement.
The final whistle saw the scoreline read 3-1 in Victory’s favour, despite a shaky start which saw the team struggle to enter their attacking third.
Even though Victory came away with the three points, Muscat admited that his side weren’t at their best.
“It’s more my reflection that I want us to improve and I’m a hard task master,” Muscat said.
“These games aren’t easy to win and we played some really good football again tonight.
“There were some good goals tonight so from my part I still think there’s improvement in us and I’m going ask my players to keep improving.”
The big turning point that set Victory in motion was the red card to Patrick Kisnorbo.
Prior to the sending off, Muscat felt that his side was not playing to the tempo required to worry the Heart defence.
“I thought that we could move the ball quicker and get it into the attacking third a lot quicker,” he said.
“In the second half, we came out and we moved the ball across their back four with a lot of speed and obviously scored very good goals in my opinion.”
Mitch Nichols scored arguably the best goal of the game when he combined with Gui Finkler for the third, but despite his strong performance, Muscat refused to single him out.
“I prefer to look at it as a team.
“From our perspective, we want to give our players in the final third the opportunity to go and impress, play well and be threatening.
“For [Nichols] to produce a performance like he did tonight, he’s had ten teammates who have worked tirelessly. Without them you obviously can’t perform to that standard.”
One of his teammates who missed the contest was Archie Thompson, who suffered a relapse of his hamstring injury in the warm-up.
Muscat did praise the attitude of his star forward, who had put the team’s best interests instead of his own.
“He got through everything required of him this week and just in the warm up he felt it tightening up and from his perspective it was a real team thing to do.
“It wouldn’t have been easy for him to put his hand up and say that he’s not at 100 per cent.
“So from that perspective it was a team decision that he made and it helped us because Connor [Pain] came in and he was good for us as well in the final third.”
In the end, Muscat was just happy to record their second win in a row, and it didn’t matter who the opponent was.
“The fact that it was Melbourne Heart, the only thing that changes is it’s a real special occasion for our members and fans,” he said.
“And a few days before Christmas, it was a nice handy Christmas present for them and they go home happy tonight.”