By Tara Murray
Point Cook couldn’t have hoped for a much better draw to start the Australia Cup competition.
The Jets were drawn to host a home match in the opening round of the competition against local Wyndham rival, West Point.
The match takes on more significance with new Jets coach Tome Petreski, having crossed from West Point in the off season, having coached them to promotion in 2023.
Petreski said he doesn’t think the two teams have played in an official match before.
“It was surprising, I was initially shocked,” he said. “There are 130 teams in the draw and we get drawn against the team I’ve just come from.
“To draw a local rival for the first game of the cup, you never know what to expect. I don’t think we’ve ever been in the same league and we now play them three times this year.”
The Jets will host the match Friday, February 14,, with the club hoping to attract a big crowd at Saltwater Reserve.
Petreski said it doesn’t get much better than Friday night games.
For Petreski, he said things were starting to come together with their squad and how they wanted to play.
“We have recruited heavily,” he said. “We are in a better spot than we were early in the off season.
“We’ve been really busy in the off season. We think we have a team that will be competitive for this fixture.
“We’ve made a lot of progress but there is still work to do in these six weeks before the season starts.
“We’ll look at things as they come and we’ll hopefully have the team ready for round one. We’re in a pretty good spot.”
Among the signings announced for the Jets are Akos Surjan, Hope Mirindi, , Sean Connor , Ruben Manyang, Luca De Amicis, Dewit Melesse, Kyle Borg and Marcus Sherif
Petreski said the Australia Cup match would be unknown being the first game of the season.
He said they were hoping to use the cup as a good warm up for the season proper.
“We will go in to try and win every game we play in,” he said. “West Point will put some good players on the park.
“We know it will be pretty tough, but if we beat them we will face a team in a higher division away.
“Hopefully we can get through a few rounds and have some competitive games.”
In other first round matches, Truganina is on the road against Old Ivanhoe Grammarians and Tarneit United will play Monash University.
