Scott Jamieson has conceded that Melbourne City are not where they want to be with regard to their aspirations for the current A-League season.
Patrick Kisnorbo’s men came into the current campaign as one of the teams that were widely tipped to go all the way, but have managed only six points from as many matches and have lost four of their last five fixtures.
The torrid start to the season has seen the Melbourne-based outfit slip to 10th in the standings, and their most recent capitulation came in their last game against Newcastle Jets that ended in a 1-0 defeat due to a first-half goal from opposition striker Valentino Yuel.
While City had enough chances through the match taking 11 shots on goal, only four of those were on target and none found the back of the net.
“I think if you watched our games, you’ll probably see that there has been too many mistakes from us as individuals and collectively we haven’t cleaned those mistakes up,” Jamieson told reporters.
“The game against Newcastle – we probably had a lot of chances to win the game. So finishing is something that we have worked on.”
City take on Sydney FC in their next game at the Melbourne Rectangular Stadium on Tuesday, having not played a competitive match since their defeat to Newcastle on Feb 7.
“It’s probably a blessing that we haven’t played a game in two weeks. You know it feels like an eternity [since the day] that we lost against Newcastle,” the skipper continued.
“Any lingering self doubt that might have come into a game if you played three days later isn’t really there at the moment, because it feels like it’s been ages since we played a game. So maybe it’s a blessing.”
While City have not been playing, the clock has ticked away for their cross-town rivals Melbourne Victory, who are under immense pressure to perform having had a miserable start to their campaign and sit at the rock bottom of the A-League.
But Jamieson’s side came into this season with bigger expectations having finished second in the standings in the last campaign.
Despite what could be described as pressure, the City captain chose instead to view the upcoming game against Sydney FC as an opportunity to set their season straight.
Jamieson said: “I don’t call it pressure. But there’s definitely a sense of disappointment. Below standards that we’ve set and we looked to have before the start of the season.
“It’s a sense of reality for us that we haven’t performed as well as we wanted to, and the expectations that we gave ourselves – we’ve fallen short.
“I’m not really worried about Western United or Melbourne Victory and where they are in the table. It’s more of a sense of we’ve fallen short of what we expected of ourselves and what a great opportunity to try and change the tide as such and beat the current champions.”
