(Reuters) – Melbourne City head coach Rado Vidosic wants his players to continue taking responsibility and enjoying themselves on the pitch after the A-League leaders handed Macarthur FC a 6-1 thrashing on Saturday.
The win, which saw Dutchman Richard van der Venne hit a hat trick, was City’s first in four games after three consecutive draws and moved Vidosic’s side eight points clear of Central Coast Mariners in the standings.
“There are teams where there’s no one in charge or no one takes charge and those teams are poor,” said Vidosic.
“There are teams where coaches are in charge and the coach makes all the decisions and I think those teams are average.
“But to be an elite team you need players to be able to make all the right decisions. We’ve been working towards that.
“It won’t work every week, but if we really want to empower them we need to give them freedom and we need to accept sometimes there’s going to be mistakes and sometime we’re going to cop the goal.
“But the more they have fun the more they’re going to produce the goods.”
City lead the current A-League standings despite having played one game fewer than their nearest rivals and look destined to cruise into the end-of-season finals.
The club has been the dominant force in the division in recent years, winning the A-League Premiership for topping the regular season table in the last two seasons while also claiming the A-League Championship in 2021.
Despite that record, Vidosic, who took over as head coach in November after his predecessor Patrick Kisnorbo left to work with French side Troyes, is continuing to look for ways to enhance his team further.
“We want to be better,” he said. “We want to improve we want to lift our standards and keep lifting our standards.
“It’s up to the players to not be complacent and take the next game as the most important game in their life. If we can manage that then there is no ceiling, we can keep improving.
“Right now we talk about being unstoppable and what can we do to be unstoppable. How does that look? This was a good example of how that looks.
“Can we continue with that, can we take it to the next level? We’ll find out next week, but this week was really pleasing.”
(Reporting by Michael Church in Hong Kong, Editing by Lincoln Feast.)
