Pehlivanis backs CEO after fiasco

WESTERN United CEO Chris Pehlivanis hopes ALeague boss Greg O’rourke is spared the axe, but says lessons must be learnt from the travel fiasco that threatened plans to finish the season.

“People shouldn’t lose jobs over a mistake,” Pehlivanis said. “It’s not life or death. It’s not just his fault, it’s everyone’s fault.

“The guy had a written agreement for us to leave the next day, and then everything changes on him, so it’s not totally his fault.”

The United, Melbourne Victory and Melbourne City squads are set to leave Victoria on Saturday for NSW, where they will go into quarantine for two weeks before being permitted to complete their seasons.

FFA hope to on Saturday release a reshaped draw for the remainder of the season, which had been scheduled to restart with a now impossible Melbourne Victory-western United clash on Thursday.

United have to try to fit six matches into the reduced time frame for matches, with nine fewer days than they would have had if they had kicked off next Thursday.

City have only three games to play and Victory, who are second last on the A-league table and would struggle to make the finals, have five.