Sydney FC boss Adam Santo is relying on a flow-on impact from the Socceroos’ memorable World Cup marketing campaign to assist lure an enormous crowd to Saturday night time’s Allianz Stadium showdown between the Sky Blues and Melbourne City.
More than 34,000 followers attended the Sydney derby on the identical venue final month earlier than the A-League went into recess for Australia’s World Cup journey in Qatar.
With the competitors resuming this week, Sky Blues chief govt officer Santo stated it was the proper time appeal to a recent wave of A-League supporters following the joy generated by the Socceroos’ achievement of reaching the knockout levels of the World Cup.
“With the spotlight being on the game at the moment, there’s no better time for fans who haven’t experienced A-League to get out to the match between the two most dominant clubs in the game in the past six years,” Santo stated.
“We need to convert the people that came out to all the (World Cup) live sites.
“There’s enough people who walked away on Sunday morning (after the Socceroos’ 2-1 loss to Argentina) saying ‘gee, that was pretty good’ and if they want another dose of ‘gee, that was pretty good; then come to the game on Saturday night.
“Now’s the time to give the A-League a go. It’s going to be an entertaining game.
“The potential’s there to get close to what we got at the derby.”
The Sky Blues are hopeful of a greater ending to proceedings on Saturday night time after shedding the derby 1-0 to the Wanderers.
It was Sydney’s second successive A-League defeat and they’re determined to redeem themselves this weekend in opposition to the top-of-the-table Melbourne membership in a match set to characteristic 4 membes of Australia’s World Cup squad – Mathew Leckie, Jamie Maclaren, Marco Tilio and Andrew Redmayne.
“It’s going to be a tough game against City. They’re clearly the benchmark,” Santo stated.
“It’s going to be important for us to get three points and move back towards the top of the ladder, or City will run away with the Premier’s Plate.”
Santo stated it was very important the Sky Blues – who’ve gained the A-League title 5 instances – once more grew to become contenders after failing to play finals soccer final season.
“Sydney FC expects to be challenging for silverware every season. To have a season where we didn’t perform to our expectation is disappointing. It’s important we don’t have a repeat of that,” he stated
“It’s a good test this Saturday night, because that’s the level we need to get back to, the level that City are currently showing in the league.”
Santo stated Sydney’s shock 2-1 win over Scottish champions Celtic in the course of the A-League break had boosted confidence within the Sky Blues camp.
“It reaffirmed to us that we do have the potential to take on the best clubs and beat them if we get it right on the night,” he stated.
“If we hadn’t have had that Celtic game, it would have been a bit flat during the break, but we’re buzzing.”
Originally printed as Sydney FC boss predicts A-League showdown at Allianz Stadium to draw recent viewers following Socceroos’ World Cup run
