Brisbane Roar star striker Besart Berisha will miss tomorrow night’s Hyundai A-League clash with Melbourne Heart with an abdominal strain.
Brisbane Roar star striker Besart Berisha will miss tomorrow night-s Hyundai A-League clash with Melbourne Heart with an abdominal strain.
Berisha, the club-s leading goal-scorer, was ruled out of the travelling squad after he failed to complete this morning-s training session at Ballymore Stadium.
Head Coach Rado Vidosic was unsure which of the Albanian-s teammates would replace him in the middle of Brisbane-s three-pronged attack.
Vidosic was opting to wait until he consulted with other members of his coaching staff before making a decision either tonight or tomorrow morning.
“I still haven-t made up my mind but we-ve got quite a few candidates who can play in that central role, Henrique is one and we-ve also got Thomas Broich and Ben Halloran,” he said.
“We-ll try not to change too much and we-ll try to keep going with our normal game.
“Hopefully, whoever comes in can replicate Besart-s workload, both offensively and defensively.
“He-s been such a great player for us, I think last year he only missed one game so we didn-t really have an opportunity to blood anyone else.
“The way we play, the way we train means whoever comes in will know what to do.”
With the other players at his disposal, Vidosic said he-d use the absence of their influential striker to test different approaches for his side up front.
“We might be a bit more mobile if the person we play there has a different influence on their centre-halves,” he said.
“If it-s Henrique, he-s smaller, lighter and maybe a little bit shaper inside the penalty box.
“I-m not sure how many players in our squad can replace Besart but we-ll have to wait and see and hopefully, whoever comes in can bring in something different that Besart hasn-t got in his game.”
The Roar coach said he-d also take the lessons from last season-s five match winless streak into the preparation for the Heart match with the Brisbane side without a victory since round two.
“What we learnt is that we need to have a Plan A, Plan B and Plan C so that if someone important isn-t playing, we can still perform equally well,” Vidosic said.
“This is going to be a big test for us.
“I-m quite sure that with all the hard work we put in pre-season and especially after last week-s game.
“Although we lost, the confidence was quite high – and I-m quite sure we can take that positive performance into tomorrow-s game as well.”
Brisbane Roar take on Melbourne Heart on Friday, 9 November at AAMI Park, Melbourne. Kick-off is at 6.30pm Brisbane time (7.30pm local time).
