Dandenong Thunder coach Dean Hennessey has chosen to take the positives out of his sides spirited extra-time loss against runaway league leaders South Melbourne on Wednesday night in their Dockerty Cup fixture.
The Thunder surprisingly outplayed South Melbourne for most of the fiery clash and held them scoreless for 90 minutes but were unable to capitalise in the final third, ultimately falling victim to a Kobbie Boahene strike in extra-time.
“Today we actually came out of age,” Hennessey said.
“We’re the first team to not let them score in 90 minutes and we should’ve really had the game finished by then…we should be in the next round.
“Football has an uncanny knack of not being fair – if it was fair, every time you played well, you’d win but you don’t.
“I just couldn’t see us losing but if there was one side that would punish you with one real chance [it’s South Melbourne],” he added.
Coming up against the state’s most dominant side was never going to be an easy task for Dean Hennessey’s men but the Thunder coach will use their strong performance in their Dockerty Cup match to gauge how his side measures up against top-ranking NPL teams.
“It’s taught them as a group that where we think we could end up – I think it gives us a really good base to build on,” he said.
“After ten rounds we’re sitting in fourth – can we go on from here? I think we still can.
“There’s still areas we’ve got to improve but tonight I think if there was a query I wanted to know it’s where do we measure up against the best team in the league at the moment and I think we measure up very well because I thought we were the better side,” he added.
Thunder defender Kris Kioussis provided a constant threat to South Melbourne’s goal as he streamed down the wing throughout the 120-minute contest, playing arguably his best game this year.
The overlapping full back put in one of his most consistent performances and almost gave his side the win in the dying seconds of regular time with a brilliant shot in space sailing only inches above the crossbar.
“[Kris Kioussis] is an unbelievable threat going forward…I wouldn’t want him running at me I can certainly tell you but I thought there was lots of great performances,” Hennessey said.
“I can’t really think of anyone who I thought ‘well I don’t think they did their job’ – I thought everyone did their job, even the subs when they came on, which is always difficult.
“Credit to South Melbourne – for us to play as well as that and still come out with nothing…they’ve got to be a decent side to beat us and they are,” he added.
Despite controlling play for the majority of the match and creating some good chances, Dandenong were unable to ultimately put the ball in the back of the net but the Thunder boss credits South Melbourne’s steely defence for being able to keep Dandenong scoreless.
“I think South’s not conceded many goals this year, the goalkeeper’s been good, their back four’s been good and to be fair, they worked hard as a team,” the Thunder coach said.
“I don’t think they’d have had to work as hard if it were any other game than this – I couldn’t remember anyone putting them under the pump like we did tonight.
Hennessey maintains that his side will take the positives out of the clash and look to build momentum for what will prove to be a month full of tough fixtures – starting with a trip to Lakeside stadium on Sunday to face South Melbourne.
“Look, I’m just looking for all the positives…we’d actually grown up today.
“What I don’t want is for this disappointment now to affect us for the next two or three weeks – we’ve got South Melbourne, a trip to Goulburn [Valley] and then we’ve got to go to Heidelberg.
“We’ll set our stall, we’ll set a goal of what we want to pick out of those three points and on the turn, still hopefully be in the top four, if not further up,” he added.