Sky Blues warm to the comforts of home at Kogarah

Sydney FC are gunning for a fourth straight victory at Jubilee Oval.

Captain Alex Brosque says the players are enjoying playing close to supporters at Jubilee Oval.

Sydney FC believe they’ve turned their makeshift lodging at Kogarah into a home, with the Sky Blues gunning for a fourth straight victory at Jubilee Oval.

Forced out of Allianz Stadium due to the rebuild of the Moore Park venue, Sydney have been forced to split their home games between the SCG, Kogarah and Leichhardt Oval this season.

But they’ll play the majority of those at Kogarah and after losing their first two there they have now won three straight going into tomorrow night’s clash with Newcastle.

“It’s exactly what we knew we were going to encounter when we started playing at these local suburban grounds,” Sydney captain Alex Brosque said yesterday.

“The action is nice and close to the people, we feel like they are right behind us.

“After a few slow starts, we’ve now hit a few games in a row there and the boys are really enjoying playing there.”

Sydney drew with the Jets on the road in their previous meeting this season, after they relinquished a 1-0 lead via a goal from a free kick. But it’s the Sky Blues’ sluggish starts that are more worrying for Brosque. They sit third on the table, in pursuit of leaders Perth, and well clear of the seventh-placed Jets.

“We’ve had a lot of slow starts this year and it’s something that we spoke about in the key period of time we have been conceding a lot of goals,” Brosque said.

“We put that right against Adelaide, started well, got a nice early goal and carried on from there.

“That’s something we’ve tried to look at and tried to fix this year, we know what type of team we are when we go ahead.”

Central Coast coach Mike Mulvey wants his team to maintain their hunger now that they’ve claimed their first win in more than 300 days in the A-League.

The Mariners’ 327-day drought was finally broken on Wednesday night, as Matt Simon tapped in a rebound from an 89th-minute penalty to claim a 2-1 victory over Melbourne City.

The win ensured the Mariners would narrowly avoid equalling two records by one match: Firstly for the longest losing streak at 11 and the most games without a win at 19.

But after singing the team song for the first time this season, Mulvey says it’s important the players see the victory as just the beginning ahead of Sunday’s clash with the lowly Brisbane.

“It’s a win, and it’s important that we have had a kill by winning,” Mulvey said.

“We’ve tasted it. Now we want to find out how hungry we are to get more.

“I’ve said for the last few weeks if we kept 11 on the field against Sydney and 11 on the field against New Zealand we would have won those games or gone close to winning those games.”

Discipline in the referee’s book wasn’t an issue on Wednesday night but controlling the ball was as Mulvey’s men completed just 68 per cent of passes. The Mariners were forced to defend well as they gave City 60 per cent of the ball and an extra 10 chances after setting up a 1-0 lead at halftime through Connor Pain.

“We turned the ball over a number of times today where we gained possession and tried to score the goal straight away or tried to create that killer pass,” Mulvey said.

“Instead of maybe building the attack a bit more. And that is part of the next stage of trying to manage the game.”

Melbourne City coach Warren Joyce insists his side didn’t fall victim to complacency in their shock loss to Mulvey’s Mariners.

Joyce maintained his men hadn’t arrived on the Central Coast believing anything short of a strong performance would get them the points.

City will train today before Saturday night’s home game against top-of-the-table Perth.

AAP