In an ominous sign for the rest of the Hyundai A-League, Central Coast Mariners coach Graham Arnold has warned his side is still yet to hit their form but were still picking up points away from home, early on in the season.
In an ominous sign for the rest of the Hyundai A-League, Central Coast Mariners coach Graham Arnold has warned his side is still yet to hit their form but were still picking up points away from home, early on in the season.
Despite losing some key personnel in the off-season the Mariners still have plenty of character and they have already shown it twice this season after coming back from two goals down away to force a draw always.
The Mariners fought back from two early goals against the Melbourne Heart to forced a 2-2 draw in Round 2 and they found themselves trailing the Jets 2-0 early in the second half of a typically spirited F3 derby before Marcos Flores and Mile Sterjovski scored to snare a 2-2 draw.
"We do our pre-season a bit different to other teams - we don't want to hit our best form in the first round, we just try to grind out some performances early on and pick up some points.
"Most teams won't settle until Round 6/Round 7 and you are seeing some funny results and some inconsistent football at the moment.
"You play 14 away games and if you can pick up a point for each away game, at the end of the season and you are winning a lot of your home games then you are going to be thereabouts again.
"At the end of the day it wasn't our best performance but it was a great comeback and the character was very good for the players again. We will get better."
The Mariners held their own in the first half of the derby clash with the Jets but gifted the Newcastle side two goals in the space of three minutes. The first from goal-mouth scramble when Scott Neville poked home from close range and the second when goalkeeper Justin Pasfield misjudged a back-pass from Trent Sainbury that trickled across the goal-line.
But Arnold went to his bench to bring on Matt Simon and Sterjovski, with both having an immediate and lasting impact as they Mariners changed formation to finish the stronger of the two teams.
"It wasn't our best performance but to go 2-0 down in the derby and come back the way we did - I thought the last half hour was all us, we only had to worry about getting caught on the break.
"When I changed the system from the way we used to play with a diamond shape and two central strikers it caused them some problems and I was happy that the boys adapted to the very well.
"That is why I took (Nick) Montogomery and (Nick) Fitzgerald off. It was not that they were playing bad or anything, it was just that they hadn't played that diamond system before.
"Marcos (Flores) when we spoke the other week, said he had played it in Argentina and we practised it for 10 minutes during the week just in case and I thought it worked well.
"We gifted them two goals - we gave them two early Christmas presents that is a disappointing thing."
Arnold admitted that both sides were a bit reserved in attack, instead focusing on aggressive defence in opening half but once the goals came the match opened up.
"I thought we started well tonight. In the first half we played some really good football but we weren't clinical in the final third - we lacked imagination. So the first half was a bit of a stalemate for both teams - it was two teams who were perhaps a bit cautious," Arnold said.
"But the second half it all opened up once we gifted them the first goal and I am a coach who takes risk - I would rather lose 5-0 than 2-0, so once we changed and went for it the boys released the hand-break as well and they went for it as well and it was good to see - we showed very good character."