Melbourne Victory skipper Roderick Miranda calls for his team to ‘fix what’s missing’

Melbourne Victory have only lost once this season but a run of six games without a win has left them frustrated.

Victory skipper Roderick Miranda says his team can’t just rely on star striker Bruno Fornaroli if the Melbourne club is to challenge for the A-League title.

The Victory have only lose once in 17 matches this season, but are without a win in their past six games heading into Tuesday night’s clash against competition cellar dwellers Western United at AAMI Park.

Five of those six contests have been draws, including Saturday night’s frustrating scoreless stalemate with Melbourne City.

Fornaroli missed the derby with a hand injury, and has only played in one of the Victory’s past seven games, having been away on Asian Cup duty with the Socceroos.

Miranda was hopeful Fornaroli – who has scored 13 goals in just 11 A-League appearances this season – would be fit to play on Tuesday night.

However, the 32-year-old central defender said his team must not be solely reliant on Fornaroli.

The Victory hope Bruno Fornaroli will return against Western United. Picture: Darrian Traynor/Getty Images

“We missed his goals when he was out,” Miranda said.

“He’s still our top scorer, our ‘number nine’ so it’ll be good to have him back, but we cannot rely on only him.

“We have 11 players on the same pitch, so 11 players need to fight for the same goal.

“If we want to score the 11 players must help, and if we don’t want to concede the 11 players must help as well.”

Miranda said could understand the frustrations of Victory fans, saying the team had similar feelings of exasperation.

“Everybody’s frustrated in the team, but everybody’s working on a daily basis,” he said.

“The spirit is there because in each game, even through we are not winning, we are fighting, we are having our chances, so it’s not lack of effort (and) it’s not lack of belief.

“Now we need to try to fix what’s missing. Maybe it’s the final touch, the final pass, the final decision – I don’t know.

“Everybody in the team is really confident that we can still do something great this season, but we have to understand that something must change.”

Miranda promised that his team would not underestimate last-placed Western United, who won for only the third time this season last Friday night in beating Newcastle 2-0.

“Western is a team (whose ladder position) doesn’t show the potential of the team,” he said.

“They’ve deserved more but they haven’t got the points. We know that they will come out strong against us, so we just need to make sure we are stronger than them.”