Kalezic praises tactical discipline
Darije Kalezic does not want to dwell on the past, but could hardly avoid it on Saturday night.
The Wellington Phoenix coach watched his side grab their first away win of the season in a 3-2 triumph over the Newcastle Jets on Saturday night with a performance that highlighted their progress since the start of the campaign.
The Phoenix blew a few big halftime leads during that time, and it looked as though history might repeat at McDonald Jones Stadium when Jets striker Andrew Nabbout scored three minutes into the second half to make the score 2-1 to the Phoenix.
But unlike earler in the season, the Phoenix didn’t implode. Instead, they got their heads down, worked hard and found a third goal through Roy Krishna.
There were still some nervy moments towards the end as Marco Rossi gave away an 86thminute penalty, converted by Dimi Petratos, but there wasn’t the widespread panic across the team that had been the feature of the capitulations this season.
Kalezic took pride in his team’s performance.
‘‘The team showed really high team tactical discipline.
‘‘I am very happy to be honest, because you all know many times we give advantage away in the first minutes of the second half and give games away in the first part of the second half.
‘‘The way how we recover after the [47th minute] goal, only a solid team can do [this], the squad who think on the same way and we show discipline, no panic at all and we did what we discussed with each other before the game and we scored the third goal, which means for us in that moment a really huge advantage and helps us to win the game.’’
Kalezic identified Petratos as a key man to shut down, handing Matthew Ridenton the job of manmarking him all game.
Ridenton’s performance drew praise from his former coach and now Jets mentor Ernie Merrick.
‘‘That was total man-marking, on the ball and off the ball. A young player, who I signed for the Phoenix. It’s good to see him doing well. I wish he hadn’t done so well [against us], but that’s going to