Brisbane Roar coach Ange Postecoglou has called on his side to continue their rich vein of form in front of goal as they embark on finals football.
The Roar surpassed the previous season record of 47 goals in a Hyundai A-League season set by Melbourne Victory in emphatic fashion, notching up 58 in their past 30 outings over the home and away season.
Coupled with the league-s most impressive defensive record having conceded just 26 times, Brisbane finished the season with a very healthy goal difference of +32 – the highest by far in the Hyundai A-League-s short history.
Looking at the statistics, Brisbane-s success in front of goal comes as no surprise with Postecoglou-s squad topping the list in the shots on goal tally, and more importantly, the shots on target category – something the Brisbane boss hopes will continue against the Mariners.
“Finals are pretty tight affairs so if you can score goals then it puts a lot of pressure on the opposition,” Postecoglou said.
“Our approach tends to be a fairly attacking one so if we can go down there and get some goals, it-s going to put pressure on Central Coast.”
Despite the high-pressure status of Saturday night-s semi-final, Postecoglou told fans to expect the same attacking flair that has become so typical of Brisbane-s play this season, admitting there was no reason to change a proven formula for success.
“I think from our point of view, we-ve done things the same way away from home as we have done at home and it-s worked pretty well,” he said.
“I think it-s important that we continue that, if we start tinkering our philosophy now, it-ll just put doubts in the players- minds about what we-ve been doing.
“What we-ve been doing has been very successful and we haven-t struggled away from home in any of our games which suggests to me our approach will work.”
The Roar are undefeated against the Mariners this season – recording a 2-0 victory at home, a 5-1 thrashing at Bluetongue Stadium before a thrilling 3-3 draw at the same venue last month – however Postecoglou said the focus wouldn-t be on past results, but on sticking to their game plan.
“That-s the key for us – we-ll go down there trying to win,” he said.
“To do that, we need to play our style of game and our style is attacking football.
“It-s not about going there and trying to get a result for the next game, I think we-ve got to go down there and score some goals.
“If we score goals, we-ve proven this year that more often than not, we-ll be successful.”
