New South Melbourne forward Milos Lujic was delighted to get off the mark for his new club in their season opener against Heidelberg United, and has set his sights on challenging for the title.
The tall centre forward was a focal point for South all evening, and made the most of some sloppy Heidelberg defending to grab a well taken goal, chipping the ball over Griffin McMaster.
His strike meant that he has lifted the burden of scoring that first goal at a new club, but Lujic was just happy that the team won in the end.
“[In the] last 20 minutes I was probably cramping but I feel happy to get the first goal, especially in the first half so bit of a weight off my shoulders,” Lujic said.
“But the main thing is to get the three points today and we got that.”
Lujic, who moved over from Northcote City in the summer, feels like he’s settling well into life at South Melbourne and is already working well with fellow new signing Jamie Reed.
“It’s been a really good pre-season, we’ve had a lot of games under our belt which is good,” he said.
“We’ve had time to gel. Most of the boys know each other really well by now except for Reed up front, he just came last week but I thought me and him worked well together up front and he’s got some quality.”
It turned out to be a fine evening for South’s debutants, with Mathew Theodore also getting on the scoresheet courtesy of a fine volley early in the match.
Lujic was pleased to be linking up with an old teammate, especially since the two go a long way back.
“I’ve known Matty for a long time, and I used to play with him at the VIS a long, long time ago,” he said.
“I know his qualities and he scored a great goal today and I hope he can set me up with a few goals this year.”
Despite the scoreline, Heidelberg United provided some stiff opposition, especially in the second half.
Lujic was pleased with the team’s level of performance which won them the contest, and challenged the squad to maintain their standard for the rest of the season..
“[Heidelberg] were tough actually, they were quite physical,” he said.
“They’re a hard working team, especially in the second half you saw they pegged us right back but I thought we could always get them on the counter attack which we did.
“Our defence stood tall and if you’re going to win a championship you need to keep clean sheets so we done that today and that was the main thing.”
Winning the inaugural National Premier League is certainly in Lujic’s sights for the season, and he believes that his team has what it takes to be successful.
“We’re off to a good start but it’s a long, long season so we’ve just got to concentrate,” he said.
“We’ve got the talent. It’s just about putting in the hard work like we did tonight week in, week out and you never know but we should be up there.”