Essendon Mazda Coach’s Comment: Ferrante wary of wounded Sydenham

Essendon Royals Interim Senior Men’s Coach Mick Ferrante is wary of a Sydenham Park side that will be itching to finally showcase their quality on Good Friday.

The season has had an underwhelming start for Friday evening’s visitors, but Ferrante said he’s not fooled by their results.

“It’s always a tough game against Sydenham and they are a quality outfit that is always there or thereabouts in this league,” he said.

“I know the results haven’t been going their way up until now, but that makes them even more dangerous and I know they’ll be up for it for sure and they’ll be coming at us hard.

“We just have to make sure we’re mentally prepared and ready for what they will throw at us.”

Ferrante said he had been pleased with the efforts shown in training during the week and was happy with the response of the boys to a disappointing result last time out against FC Strathmore.

“Result aside, I think we played quite well in terms of our performance, so it’s been important to not let the boys get their heads down and make sure we’re focussed on putting it right,” he said.

“It was a disappointing result, but we created a lot of chances and on another night we could win that quite comfortably.

“It was an off day in front of goal, but even in the games we’ve won we’ve probably not scored as many as we should, so we need to rectify that and we need to marry that with more concentration at the back.”

Ferrante said he had been pleased with the overall group performance levels since the start of the season, as well as the individual shifts put in across the board, but said the performances of some players off the bench were making discussions at the selection table very interesting.

“I think our normal experienced heads have been really reliable,” he said.

“And I was very happy with the performances of Nobu and Josh Markovski off the bench last week. I think every time those boys have come on they’ve made a difference in the game, so they’ll be ready for any opportunity they get.

“It’s a big squad and we’ll need all of them to get where we need to go this season and I’ve just been pleased with the buy-in from everyone as individuals.”