Arthur Diles has backed his Melbourne Victory players to land a positive result against Macarthur FC.
A third consecutive interstate trip takes the Boys in Blue to New South Wales on Friday, December 5, kick-off 7:35pm, in Round 7 of the Isuzu UTE A-League.
The visit to Campbelltown Sports Stadium, where a Finals football spot was secured back in April, comes after matches at Sydney FC and Brisbane Roar ended in defeats for the away side.
Victory will be without the suspended Denis Genreau, but Nishan Velupillay is in contention for a first start of the 2025/26 season after featuring off the bench versus the Roar.
Speaking during his pre-match press conference, Diles implored the First Team squad to keep pushing in the pursuit of three points, explaining that a little more quality at the business end of the pitch could go a long way to securing wins.
“We’ve got to keep going. We’ve got to keep building on our performance. We have to maybe manage moments in matches a little bit street-smart, which is something we’re continuing to work on. In terms of effort and application, they’re working hard every day; they’ve worked hard every match.
“There’s been little things letting us down, maybe quality in the front third, sometimes it’s let us down, but not through lack of trying or through lack of getting there often. As long as that’s happening, we’ve got to harness that and not let go of that, because in the end, that’s putting us in positions where we can get a result in a match.”
Macarthur have been balancing ALM and Asian Champions League Two commitments at the beginning of the 2025/26 campaign.
Although competing in two different competitions, their play style tends to be consistent, and Diles is well aware of the combative forward threat the Bulls are likely to pose this weekend.
“First, you’ve got to cut it at the source. They’re a team in this league that makes the most crosses into the box out of anybody. There’s a purpose behind that, and a reason because you’ve got two man mountains up there, and one at any given time will be on the pitch. So they play to their strengths.
“You identify the strengths and weaknesses in the opponent, while we continue to build on what we need to build on. So they’re part of the problem, and the other problem is working on ourselves and making sure we get ourselves right.”
Watch Diles’ full press conference below.