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Josh Rose set to make 200th Hyundai A-League start

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The Central Coast Mariners would like to congratulate Josh Rose who is in line to make his 200th Hyundai A-League start against the Western Sydney Wanderers on Saturday.

In the Mariners tough road trip to Spotless Stadium, Rose will be hoping to retain his spot in the starting line up to reach his proud milestone.

Rose would become just the ninth outfield player in the history of the league to reach 200 starts. Incredibly, Rose has a grand total of 201 appearances in the Hyundai A-League from his time at the New Zealand Knights, Mariners and Melbourne City coming off the bench just twice.

After Friday’s training session, Rose spoke about the long journey across his career in the Hyundai A-League which started in 2005 with the New Zealand Knights and included a stint with Universitatea Craiova in Romania.

“It has been a long journey,” Rose said. “Looking back at the way I did it, you probably couldn’t do it these days on that pathway, there’s a lot of different pathways with NPL. The game is a lot more expensive for juniors, which is a little bit disappointing in my opinion. But I’m glad that I’m here, and it’s a credit to my teammates along the way and all the coaches and mentors I’ve had to get me this far,” Rose said.

Looking ahead to Saturday’s round two fixture against the Wanderers, Rose said that the full focus is on bouncing back after round one and spoke highly of Western Sydney who defeated Perth Glory 2-1 in their season opener.

“I said to the boys just have belief in what we’ve been working on, we had some fantastic results in the pre-season, so we’ve got to get back to that, playing that sort of game,” Rose said. “Round one has finished, we can get back to form this week and get back to the way that we want to play.

“We started extremely well [against Newcastle], but in the A-League when you give teams too many chances and too much space, you will get punished. To be fair to Newcastle they were ruthless last weekend, but we need to be a lot tighter defensively and as a team. Like I said, I think it will be the result that gives us that kick that we need,”

“Western Sydney recruit well every season, and they’ve done extremely well this season. They had a great result last week and they did look dangerous, we’ve got to be on our toes.

“It’s never easy going away and playing at Western Sydney, so for us it’s about getting back to the way that we want to play, being compact, limiting their space, and if we can do that then I’m sure in attack that we can create chances. We’ve got good players as well so we can just focus on that,” Rose said.

Looking back on his incredible career where Rose has notched up a stack of individual and team accolades, the 2011 Mariners Medallist said the biggest thanks of all must go to his wife, Jeni.  

“There’s many people to thank,” Rose said. “All my teammates along the way, football is a team game, you can’t do it without teammates, you can’t do it without good coaching, and good coaching staff mentoring you.

“More than anyone that’s supported me has been my wife. She’s moved from country to country and been through a lot, many ups and downs, through the bad losses she probably copped it the most. She sticks by me the whole time, and she gives me that support I need to keep kicking on,” Rose said. 

When asked about his career highlight, Rose said the answer was simple. Winning the 2013 Hyundai A-League Championship against the Western Sydney Wanderers.

“We worked hard for a good three-year period to get to that point, and it was a fantastic night. Hopefully this group here can build something special over the next three years,” Rose said.

Match Details
Saturday, 14 October 2017
Hyundai A-League Round 2
Match: Western Sydney Wanderers vs. Central Coast Mariners
Venue: Spotless Stadium, Sydney Olympic Park
Kick-off: 5:35pm
TV Broadcast: Live coverage on FOX SPORTS AUSTRALIA 501
Hash-tag: Join the match conversation using #WSWvCCM & #CCMFC

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