Young gun stars, City to look into injuries
Anna Harrington |
Melbourne City coach Aurelio Vidmar couldn’t help but be delighted with how 20-year-old striker Max Caputo stepped up to lead a 4-0 rout of Perth Glory.
But City will conduct a “deep dive” into their football programs after two hamstring injuries in the space of a week, as they attempt to avoid a repeat of last season’s injury crisis.
Caputo, 20, scored in City’s season-opening draw with Western Sydney, then delivered the winner in their Asian Champions League Elite win over Buriram United on Tuesday.
He made it four goals in three matches by striking in the fifth and 36th minutes at AAMI Park on Saturday to deliver City’s first win of the A-League Men season.
“With strikers, there’s always a massive expectation on those guys to keep scoring goals but we don’t put that pressure on him,” Vidmar said.
“What we love about Max is, even after the game, he goes, ‘I’ve had a shit game’ – I wouldn’t mind having a crap game as well, scoring two goals.
“That’s how Max is. He’s always striving for perfection, and that can be a good thing, and that also can be a bad thing.”
City were without hamstrung pair Samuel Souprayen and Elbasan Rashani and will review their program, given the club had to fight back from a horror injury run last season to claim the championship.
“We’re looking into it, because we’re obviously not doing something right in the program somewhere,” Vidmar said.
“So we have to put our hand up and we can’t put our heads in the sand and we’ve got to have a deep dive into it.
“Because it’s two hammies, so there’s obviously something that we haven’t got quite right.Β
“No-one’s to blame. We’re probably just missing something in the program that’s affecting a couple of the guys and we just need to make sure that we get that right.”
Perth recruit Jaiden Kucharski suffered a groin injury in the first half, and Brandon O’Neill played on after tweaking his right hamstring.
Striker Adam Taggart, who was managing heel soreness, was substituted in the second half but Glory coach David Zdrilic was confident he would be OK to face Melbourne Victory on Friday.
He instead lamented a poor start and lack of physicality.
“Away from home, we need to start games stronger than that,” Zdrilic said.Β
“And we knew physically they’re going to be dominant, and we weren’t able to match it.”
City added a third when Zane Schreiber, 20, fizzed a wonderful left-footed strike into the top corner in the 84th minute.
Seven minutes later, Kavian Rahmani, 18, put an exclamation mark on the victory when he cut inside and ripped a sensational strike, home.
Β City (1-1-0) travel to Brisbane for Friday night’s game at Suncorp Stadium.
AAP
