Cringila coach Icko Atanasoski has called on his players to "maximise their chances" as they return to the Lions den to face the Blueys on Monday.
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After last year's disappointing campaign where they finished 11th, "Crini" were active in the player market - signing the likes of Ben Zucco, Michael Mendes and Steve Ugrinovski - and looked like one of the Premier League's biggest improvers during pre-season.
The stop-start nature of this year's IPL competition due to rain has somewhat stalled that momentum, but the Lions opened their 2022 account with a 3-0 win over Bellambi a fortnight ago.
Zucco, Mendes and Anthony Krtsteski all found the back of the net at Ian McLennan Park. However, Atanasoski - who took over Cringila's reins from Michael Gbrevski last September - believes his side has plenty of room for improvement.
"That result was good, but I don't think the performance wasn't anywhere what we've done in pre-season. We're obviously happy with the 3-0 win but we always want to improve on our performances, and there were certain aspects of that performance that need improvement," Atanasoski said.
"The key for us, and it has for us pretty much all of pre-season, is taking our chances. We create a lot but we need to take them because the tougher the games get, you're not going to get six, seven or eight chances, you might only get one or two. So it's important for us to maximise our chances."
Monday's game is just the 13th out of a possible 48 league matches to go ahead this season as wet weather continues to halt the IPL's momentum. Football South Coast announced on Saturday that the IPL and District League would both be lengthened by six weeks to ease the potential congestion of make-up games.
"We hope to be able to confirm the round schedule over the next four weeks. However, there is no change (other than dates associated with Bert Bampton and Youth Cup matches) to the calendar up to round 18 as a minimum," FSC said.
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Joshua Bartlett
A sporting fanatic who is keen to promote all codes in the Illawarra and abroad. Mercury's chief football reporter.
A sporting fanatic who is keen to promote all codes in the Illawarra and abroad. Mercury's chief football reporter.
