Kevin Muscat Praises Honda after Win over Newcastle Jets

Melbourne Victory manager Kevin Muscat came in with praise of superstar Keisuke Honda after the recent 1-0 success over Newcastle Jets. Victory picked up the first victory of the campaign thanks to the 19^th minute goal from Terry Antonis. This game happens to be a rematch of the Grand Final of last season. It was not a very attractive match considering that there were difficult conditions for both teams. However, Victory were able to pick up the three points owing to a lot of desire shown by the players. Particularly, Honda came in with a special mention from the manager, as he was able to put in a huge shift over the 90 minutes.

Despite being one of the star players in the Melbourne Victory team, Honda was not afraid to put in work rate that made other players appear to be lazy. At the end of the game, Victory manager Kevin Muscat claimed that Honda’s contribution was instrumental in helping the team to get a victory. Since moving to the club in the summer, Honda has been part of three matches and he has come up with one goal and three assists in during this period. Ironically, Melbourne Victory were able to beat Newcastle Jets by the same score in the recent final.

“His [Honda] contribution is immense; you can see at the death there, what it meant to him, with his work rate, to get that victory.Jimmy (Troisi) and Keisuke really took control of the football and allowed the rest of the team to come into it. I thought it was a good, solid performance away from home in difficult conditions. You’ve got to turn up for a contest and for a battle and from that perspective, I thought it was a huge improvement in our performance from that angle,” said Muscat.