By Tara Murray
The hot start by Plenty Valley Lions to the state league 4 north soccer season continued on Saturday with a 5-0 win against Old Xaverians.
Undefeated in the first five rounds, the Lions sit atop the table.
While the scoreboard seems to indicate a lopsided result, Lions coach Robert Dolevski said the match didn’t feel that way.
“The first half they were the better team,” he said. “We scored just before half-time against the run of play and it was at the right time.
“We refined a few things at half-time and plugged a few holes … credit to the boys, they took the game on and started to play our brand of footy.
“They[Old Xaverians] got a red card, which didn’t help.”
Dolevski said scoring five goals and keeping a clean sheet away from home had been a real positive.
Bobi Petrovski and Daniel Paunkoski scored twice each, while Shin Kyung-Min scored the other goal.
Dolevski said things had been goning to plan on both ends of the field.
“We’re going into every game believing that we can win,” he said.
“We’re sharing the goal scoring around. It was a worry we would have to rely on Luis Gonzalez De La Sierra, but we’ve found other avenues.
“Luis has five goals, but we’ve had seven different goal scorers.
“Defensively, we’ve only conceded three goals, which have all been from set pieces. We’re pretty happy with we’re we are going defensively.”
Dolevski, in his first year as senior coach, said things were going well outside of game day as well.
Having made a number of changes off field to the culture and professionalism at the club, Dolevski said it was starting to show.
“Last season, we weren’t getting many people to training,” he said.
“Now we’re getting 22 players to training each night.
“The professionalism is really good and we’ve got two assistant coaches and a goalkeeping coach.
“We’ve got depth in the squad, which will be important for us.
“Keeping everyone together and on the same page might be the difference for us at the end of the season.”
Dolevski said there was a clear target.
“The goal is to win the league and get promoted and we’re heading in the right direction,” he said.
In other results, Greenvale United lost to Heidelberg United.
In state league 2 north-west, Epping City beat Corio, Mill Park lost to Hoppers Crossing and Hume United fell short against Fitzroy City.
In state league 3 north-west, Lalor United and Upfield had wins, while Craigieburn City lost to Strathmore.
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