Kosta Barbarouses has no shortage of motivation when his Brisbane Roar side host the Wellington Phoenix on Friday night. After rarely featuring in Ricki Herbert's Phoenix line up during his time at the club and having been left out of the All Whites World Cup squad by the same manager, Barbarouses will be itching to make a big impact against his former teammates.
Since arriving in Queensland, the Wellingtonian striker has been a key member of Ange Postecoglou's young Brisbane side - a side that has started the new A-League season with a lot of promise, playing a very high tempo, fluid style of football. Barbarouses scored several confidence-boosting goals pre-season, including one against visiting EPL side Everton, and also had a very strong opening season match against Gold Coast United. Last week he was not as prominent, but Brisbane still picked up a very convincing win over champions Sydney FC.
Playing at the point of the attack and preferred so far over Brazillian Heinaldo, Barbarouses has made up for his lack of size with great mobility and workrate. His incisive passing and link play, along with a relentless hounding of opposition defenders has been a feature of his game so far this season. And he will be looking to give Ben Sigmund and Andrew Durante a similarly hard time on Friday.
A good performance will go a long way to securing Barbarouses a spot in the All Whites squad to face Honduras and Paraguay in October.
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