A-League: Melbourne City forced to reshuffle for Wanderers

Melbourne City are without two suspended in-form players but confident of maintaining their strong form against the Wanderers.

Melbourne City coach Erick Mombaerts. Picture: Getty Images

Melbourne City are without two suspended in-form players but confident of maintaining their strong A-League form when they host Western Sydney at AAMI Park on Saturday.

City are missing Adrian Luna and Rostyn Griffiths but coach Erick Mombaerts is emphasising the need to back up a statement win over Perth Glory.

City have also claimed both their previous encounters against Western Sydney but Jean Paul de Marigny has since replaced Markus Babbel as Wanderers coach.

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“They have changed their coach but they haven’t changed their style too much,” Mombaerts said.

“We’ve seen the last game against Brisbane – they haven’t changed too much.

“All A-League games are difficult to play but for us it’s the same idea – we try to set up our style first, we adjust maybe some little things but we have to keep focused on the way we want to.

“Every game we try to improve a little detail but we don’t change too much … but we respect this team – they’re strong (and) very athletic so we need to be ready to face this team.” Harrison Delbridge will slot in at centre back, while Connor Metcalfe is in contention to replace Luna.

The Wanderers are three points outside the top six and coming off a 3-1 loss to Brisbane – a result de Marigny considered a “little setback”.

“(City are) a good side, they’ve got some good players and are very well coached,” de Marigny said. “But so are we; we’re one of the form teams at the moment.

“So we’re looking forward to playing against them and there’s a few areas we feel we can hurt them, and that’s important that we’re ready for those moments.”

As of Friday, the game was scheduled to go ahead as planned despite concerns over the coronavirus.

AAP