Work for Phoenix to do while returning Taylor quarantines
Ufuk Talay has a points target for the Wellington Phoenix, as they look to rise from the depths of the A-League ladder and into the top six for a third season in a row.
But he’s keeping that number close to his chest as they prepare for today’s visit from Perth Glory to WIN Stadium that will kick off what the club has dubbed Wollongong Appreciation Month – a celebration of their temporary home that will have them wearing a new home kit featuring the local colour, red.
It’s fair to say things are as good right now in the Phoenix camp as they have been all season. They won for just the second time in nine matches when they beat the Newcastle Jets last Sunday and kept their first clean sheet to boot.
Then they welcomed back former captain and defender Steven Taylor, who will join them once he’s completed his two-week stay in hotel quarantine after arriving from India. But if they are to kick on, put their early-season woes behind them, and qualify for the finals, they don’t have a lot of margin for error.
While Talay opted to keep his own counsel with regards to what he thinks they need, a look at the last five A-League seasons shows the sixth-placed team has earned between 35 and 41 points.
Things are slightly different this season, with 12 teams taking part instead of 11, as there were last season, or 10, as there were in the four seasons before that, but it feels safe to take the mid-point of that range, 38, as a rough guide for what is needed.
To get to 38 points, the 11th– placed Phoenix will need to pick up 30 more from their 17 remaining matches, around 1.8 points per game, and therein lies the rub. At their best – in the 2014-15 season, when they picked up 46 points from 27 matches – they averaged 1.7 points per game.
So to make it to the business end of the season this time, they need to start performing as well as they ever have as soon as possible. ‘‘We’ve got a target that we set within the group, where we want to be by the end of round 26,’’ Talay said. ‘‘I still believe that we aren’t playing bad football. I still believe we are playing some decent football at times.
‘‘I think Newcastle wasn’t our greatest performance, but we got the result that we needed for the confidence of the group and if we keep playing the way that we’re going, and we are clinical, and we keep clean sheets, I think we’re headed in the right direction.
‘‘We’ve just got to keep pushing and keep going and the reality is we just take it game by game.’’
The return of Taylor should be a big boost to the Phoenix’s hopes, not only because he should easily be their best defender, but because he will also offer a wealth of experience and leadership – two qualities they could definitely use more of.
He will be fresh out of quarantine by the time the Phoenix play the Brisbane Roar on March 21, but his 50th A-League appearance for the club is more likely to come when they visit Melbourne to play the Victory three days later or when they host Macarthur FC four days after that.
There was further good news yesterday with Talay revealing forward Jaushua Sotirio was back in training and set to be available for next Monday’s trip to play Western Sydney Wanderers, giving him a full squad to choose from except for long-term injury absentee Luke DeVere. Talay has choices to make ahead of today’s clash but hinted on Saturday he would stick with the bulk of the XI that beat Newcastle 2-0 – if not all.