Sydney FC and Melbourne Victory have fought their way into the final Sydney FC and Melbourne Victory have fought their way into the final

One is a first time W-League coach who took over late in the season, the other is a W-League fixture.  We caught up with grand final coaches Fabrizio Soncin and Alen Stajcic for their thoughts ahead of this weekend's finale.

Fabrizio Soncin

Soncin took charge late | (Credit: Zee Ko) Soncin took charge late | (Credit: Zee Ko)

We knew Perth were probably going to be fairly direct. We knew that they were going to be relying a lot on Lisa De Vanna and [Kate] Gill up front and try and get the ball to those players directly.  

It forced us on the back foot a little bit and slightly forced us to deviate a little bit from our game.  All I did was re-inforce what our game plan was and re-focus on our game.

Handling the high pressure

I thought they [the players] handled it quite well.  Again it was mainly making sure players focused on their jobs and nothing else.  We prepared to be able to deal with the pressure and I thought the players dealt with it very, very well.

Jumping the semi-final hurdle  

Obviously that has given them a lot of confidence now and they know it can be done.  They have come close in the past and now we are just a step further.

Resilience of the squad this season

Sometimes adversity can either make you or break you.  In this case a lot of the setbacks and so forth has made the team stronger.

Pain can make you or break you but I think as a group collectively that has had to overcome all different types of adversity this season, they have done that and now they are stronger for it.

Shared Captaincy

Some teams have one or two individuals that are stand out leaders.  I think the unique thing about this team is that we have become strong collectively. It's almost like they are one mind.  There is no one person that is the leader as everyone plays a leadership role at one point or another.

Handling the grand final nerves

Whether it's because of past disappointments or the goals that were set at the start [of the season] or the turmoil that the team has gone through in season but in the end we have one common purpose and that’s to win [the grand final].

Approaching Sydney FC

For us its really no different to how you approach anyone else.  You want to know something about the opposition, to have an idea on how they are lined up and their general style of play.  I don't want to get them [the players] too obsessed with the opposition because the key for us is knowing what we have to do in order for us to play well.

The game is all about time and space.  They can't occupy the whole field and certain areas on the field.  It is up to us to create the space where we want and exploit the space where they don't want us to go.  So in a nutshell it is focusing on our game, how we want to play and we want to dictate the game with the ball or without the ball.

Message to the Melbourne supporters

Come out and make a lot of noise.  Get behind them and give the girls every bit of support that you can.

Alen Stajcic

Alen Stajcic is looking for his second championship | TWG Alen Stajcic is looking for his second championship | TWG

Semi final against Brisbane Roar 

That was a tremendous match.  We played really well in the first half but Brisbane really came out firing in the second half and dominated most of the half.

After their second goal and the red card they really had us under pressure but credit to our team we really stuck at it.  The team showed great strength and character to hold Brisbane out and over the 90 minutes I really think we deserved the win.

Learning from loss

I don't think we were really out played [when they met in Round 11] and certainly we said it to the team.  We watched the game and the shot count from that game [Round 11] to this game [the semi-final] were almost the same and the possession count was almost the same.  It was just on that day they managed to get two goals and we didn’t get any.  We actually took a lot of confidence from that game.

Season form and play

We have played good patches in most games during the year and in some games we have slackened off and have been punished for it.  I guess those are the characteristics of a young and immature team that is developing.

Hopefully as we grow and develop over the next few years that is something that we will become a lot more consistent with.

Handling the pressure

We don't really have many older players [laughs].  When we say older we mean Renee Rollason who is 23, Teresa Polias 22 and Kyah Simon 21.  Renee Rollason was terrific and has been all year.  Teresa was wonderful again and young Sham Khamis is growing into the role [goalkeeper] in a brilliant fashion.  Sam Kerr was just unique and we know what Sam can do on her day and that is the first time she has produced a 90 minute game where she just carved up the opposition like we know she can.

Grand Final preparations

We are keeping on training the same way that we have all year and focusing on Melbourne specifically.  We are training to cater for their strengths and some of their weakness.  They have quite a few strengths that we have to negate somehow and got a couple of weakness that Perth exploited last week and we will try and exploit as well.  So that is the focus of our week.

We are not really focusing of the match as being a final but just another match and the fact that it is a final is just another label that we put on it.  We just have to come out and play our best 90 minutes or 120 minutes.

Covering unavailable players

We have got Emma Kete out because of the red card last week and Ellyse Perry is out because of cricket commitments.  Ellyse has missed a couple of matches throughout the year which in hind sight is almost a positive because we have got people ready to go in each position and we certainly have enough squad depth to cover them.

Message to Sydney Supporters

I just really hope they come out in numbers.  What the RBB did the other week [Round 12] has been unmatched in the W-League who have been the standout.  We hope a lot of people from The Cove can come out and support the girls especially as the Big Blue is on the night before.  We hope that they come out in big numbers and really support the team because it will give them a big lift away from home.