Melbourne City will be looking to continue its impressive start to the season when it meets Melbourne Victory in Thursday’s derby.
Determined to rectify missing the finals last season – City is on track to record its best start to a campaign since it completed the Premiership/Championship double in season 2015/16.
While City announced itself as a contender for silverware at the weekend – defeating Sydney FC away from home – the side must quickly shift their attention to Thursday’s derby.
Despite the short turnaround – goalkeeper Lydia Williams says the side will depend on its previous experience against the Victory.
“The last couple of seasons we haven’t got off on the right foot in the first couple of games,” she said.
“It was pretty disappointing missing out on the finals [last season], so I think for us that have been around for a number of seasons really wanted to come back and make sure that this season we started out strongly.
“It’s been more recovery this week more than anything, we didn’t really have that much time to prepare for them, but I guess with how we’ve been performing it’s been about making sure our bodies are fit and healthy.
“We’ve played Victory multiple times and obviously in pre-season we got to play them as well so it’s going to be an exciting one.
“Sometimes when you have a longer break you can over-analyse and over-think things, so I think with the shorter break we really kind of knuckled down on the most important things.
City sits in second on the table on equal points with the Western Sydney Wanderers, while a win for the Victory could see them jump inside the top four.
