Kevin Muscat Focuses on Fitness after Pre-Season Draw with Brisbane

Melbourne Victory were able to claim a 1-1 draw with Brisbane Roar in a pre-season friendly match. This was a tough game for both clubs and it was Victory who took the lead in the 20^th minute through veteran Leigh Broxham. However, Brisbane were able to respond within two minutes as Adam Taggart was able to bring the opposition back on level terms. Kevin Muscat, though, was not too worried about the result of the game, as he felt that this match was only about building fitness ahead of the new campaign.

Muscat was finally able to get success at the Australian A-League by beating Newcastle in the final of the 2017-18 campaign. Even though Melbourne Victory were only able to finish in the top six places, they were able to claim a strong surge of form in the play-offs. Now, the club will be hoping to achieve a repeat of last season but most of the teams have made a substantial improvements and it will be a difficult campaign once again. Victory could have achieved a positive result against Brisbane had it been for the presence of new signing Keisuke Honda, who will give a lot more quality to the team. Muscat, though, has revealed that he had held back from using Honda due to the state of the pitch.

“It was one of those [where] the conditions weren’t great, the pitch was pretty heavy because of the rain, but other than that I thought it was a worthwhile hit-out for the boys in terms of building on fitness.From a fitness perspective we were really pleased because I thought in the last 15 to 20 minutes I thought our level of fitness was very good and it was evident in the game. We were hoping to get a little bit more out of him [Honda],” said Muscat.