Soccer: Greenacre ready for Adelaide backlash

Chris Greenacre in action. Photo / APN

Wellington Phoenix striker Chris Greenacre has played more than enough football to know when he is in for a challenge.

The 34-year-old, who began his professional career with Manchester City in 1995, is expecting Adelaide United to come out swinging when they host the Phoenix at Hindmarsh Stadium in the city of churches tomorrow night (Fri).

Adelaide have dropped to the bottom of the A-League ladder following Gold Coast United's shock 1-0 win over the Brisbane during the week. .

"It's going to be tough," Greenacre said. "Whenever you go bottom of the league, you know you want to come out fighting. You look on paper, their team is a very, very good team and they've got a new manager now, probably a new regime, so everybody's going to be wanting to earn that starting role.

" I've been in that position before where you have gone to the bottom of the league and it's not a nice place to be. So that following game, you come out all guns blazing. It's important we go there and try to jump all over that early and cause them problems early doors and hopefully that'll frustrate them."

The Phoenix have won three from their past four outings but their inability to perform on the road has carried into this season and they went down 3-1 to the Melbourne Victory in their last game away from home.

Adelaide's grabbed a point from a 2-2 draw with Sydney FC in their last outing and along with new coach John Kosmina have also changed captain this week with Jon McKain being relieved of the armband in favour of goalkeeper Eugene Galekovic.

Greenacre, who joined the Phoenix in 2009, has taken on an assistant coaching role with the club this season and holds a Uefa B coaching licence.

Many assumed his playing time would have dwindled this year but injuries and suspensions - as well as his own good form - have seen him play in each of the Phoenix's 13 games this season.

He scored a well-timed header in the 5-2 romp over Newcastle last Friday night in Wellington, which was a fine way to celebrate his 34th birthday.

"I'm loving it. It was a massive week for us last week and a fantastic result and it's just great to be part of the result like that. I just keep managing the body and keep playing on and, hopefully, I can continue."

Wellington welcome back Tony Lochhead (groin) and Nicky Ward (concussion) this week, which meant Alex Smith and Brent Griffiths dropped out of the 15 that destroyed Newcastle.

Smith's omission was particularly unlucky given his sound form during the past two games, but Lochhead's return means the backline will be shuffled and Vince Lia returns to the midfield in place of Smith.

Greenacre said the squad was on a high given their current form.

"It's fantastic, you can just see the enjoyment the boys are having. The boys are just wanting to come to training everyday and over the Christmas period it's been a busy time but yet we've managed to pick these results up.

"Early on, we took some criticism in the press, which we thought was unjust. The league is so tight and then we've come out with three in four so we've kind of backed that up on the pitch and that's all we can continue to do."

Wellington sit fifth on a congested A-League points table and face another busy stretch of games with Sydney and Perth coming to town next week for games at Westpac Stadium on Wednesday and Sunday respectively.