Not content with just the four unanswered goals, a delighted Sydney FC Head Coach Steve Corica said the squad could have scored even more in their record AFC Champions League win over Shanghai SIPG.
Strikes to Captain Alex Wilkinson and Luke Brattan coupled with a brace to Trent Buhagiar steered the Sky Blues to their biggest ever win in the competition, and Corica said it was a just result for the endeavour his players have shown during their time in Qatar.
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HIGHLIGHTS: Shanghai SIPG v Sydney FC
“I’m very pleased for the players, they deserved that game,” he said.
“They played really well, dominated from start to finish and scored some excellent goals. Trent Buhagiar got two great goals and maybe could have ended up with more.
“The final score I was very pleased with and I think that game has been coming. The first two game have been good, we’ve had our opportunities but I think today we showed exactly what we can do playing against a very good team.
“We’re proud of what the players have achieved tonight.
“I think each game we’ve improved a lot, we’ve grown,” he continued.
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“Obviously it’s preseason for us, we’re starting to get better and fitter and you can see that. I think we’ve deserved more out of our games, it’s not a great record [our AFC Champions League record], but we’ve been in a lot of those games but conceded late on in games.
“We’re pleased with where we are at the moment. We’ve got a tough game coming up against Yokohama, that’ll be another test for us, and we’re looking forward to it.”
Corica said the performance against the Chinese giants showed the qualities the back-to-back A-League Champions possess, as he set his sights on reversing the previous result against Japanese Champions Yokohama F. Marinos on Friday evening.
“ The performance [against Shanghai] showed how good of a side we are with the ball,” he said.
“We’re working hard from the front with the forwards all the way to the back and we played some really good stuff.
“It would be fantastic to win again against Yokohama, they’re a really good side and they beat us early on in the group before the bubble,” he continued.
“It’s going to be a good challenge for us. We know Ange [Postecoglou] their coach very well, being an Australian, and it would be great to get another win.
“We know it’s going to be a tough game but every game we go in to, we go in to win and that will be no different.”
Sydney FC face Yokohama F. Marinos in their final group stage game of the 2020 campaign on Friday 4th December (kick off 9pm AEDT).
