Words: Simon Smale
Image: Anthony Napoli

Brisbane City defender Greg King is convinced that by focussing on their own game, he and his teammates will see off Redlands United in both the league and the cup over the next five days.

City travel to second-placed Redlands tonight in PlayStation 4 National Premier Leagues before backing up against the same side at home on Tuesday in the Westfield FFA Cup Preliminary Round 6.

King, who has excelled in his new central defensive role at City this year under John Kosmina following an off-season move from Brisbane Strikers, said he doesn’t believe playing the same opponent twice in succession will affect either team’s approach.

“I actually had a similar situation with Strikers last year, where we lost to (Redlands) in the league and beat them in the cup,” King explained.

"Obviously this year I’d like to win both. But we’re really at this point just focusing on the first game and then as soon as that’s done we’ll turn our focus to Tuesday.”

“Like any good club you want to look after yourselves, and that’s not to disrespect anyone you’re playing but you want them to alter their game plan and alter their approach to the game to accommodate what you're doing as opposed to us changing ours to accommodate them.”

Redlands are undefeated in their past six games across both the league and cup, but King is confident the quality Cleveland Showgrounds surface will assist City put an end to that run.

“It’s a great pitch out there so that’ll suit our style of play. We like to get the ball down and play and we've got some very skilful guys on the team so it should be a very high quality game.”

Despite a raft of off-season changes, City have proved a solid performer this year – sitting fifth in the standings, six points behind league-leader FNQ Heat.

King said he believes the team are “on par” this season and their position is a fair reflection on some promising, but also inconsistent, performances.

“I think we are playing similar to what you'd expect from a fairly young team” King said.

“Some weeks we play great and really show our potential and some weeks we struggle and show some of that inexperience and lack of maturity.”

“Kossy (John Kosmina) talks about focusing for the full 90 minutes, and if you look at a lot of our games there are those 3-4 minute periods where the quality drops off.”

“At this level you play some pretty good teams and if you do fall asleep they can get a goal and then you're chasing the game,” he concluded.

PlayStation 4 National Premier Leagues 2016 – Round 10
Friday, May 13
Redlands United FC v Brisbane City FC
Cleveland Showgrounds, Redland City
Kick-off at 7:00PM

Westfield FFA Cup 2016 – Preliminary Round 6
Tuesday, May 17
Brisbane City FC v Redlands United FC
Kick-off at 7:00PM