Melbourne Knights coach Andrew Marth was elated with Sunday night’s Dockerty Cup triumph over South Springvale Aris, declaring he was proud to help the club achieve its first piece of silverware in seven years.
In a nail-biting encounter, his side was pushed the full 120 minutes by the dogged State League One club, only securing victory a minute before the penalty shootout when Tomislav Uskok tapped home from close range.
While the Knights’ mentor was ultimately proud of his side’s performance, he also heaped praise on his opponents’ spirit and endeavour.
“They made it extremely difficult for us. They were quite physical early on, we tried to play football and they closed us down,” Marth said.
“They’re not in the final 16 of the FFA Cup for nothing.
“They’ve got a lot of experience in there, their work rate’s phenomenal.
“Obviously they tired a little in extra time, and we probably played a lot better in extra time than what we did in the 90 minutes, but I thought we thoroughly deserved the game.”
With a rollercoaster season including the heights of an FFA Cup appearance and the lows of an NPL campaign plagued by injury and poor form, the coach was glad his side was able to bury their demons and fight to the end for the win.
“In hindsight it probably should have been five or six [goals], it’s the story of our season thus far, dominating teams and not putting chances away,” he said.
“It’s happened to us during the course of the year – conceding goals last minute – and thankfully we got one [ourselves].”
The club legend, who has enjoyed a distinguished playing and coaching career at Somers Street, was honoured to add to the club’s sizeable trophy cabinet and lauded the nerves and thrills of a finals appearance which he admitted has been the clubs focus for weeks now.
“We haven’t won any silverware for 7 years and the Knights are a proud club with proud heritage – to get back on the top scale so to speak is a great achievement,” he said.
“Our season was over three weeks ago, our priority was Dockerty Cup.
“We’ve got three more games to play and we’re not going to get relegated, so we’re going to play our young teams and obviously build for next year.”