The fruit of Western Sydney Wanderers labour may not appear for a matter of months as midfielder Kearyn Baccus calls for fans' patience while the players go through a complete overhaul of the club's football philosophy.
The arrival of new coach Josep Gombau has not so much as coincided with a crash course in learning a new style, but a major re-education in the way the players look at the game. Results haven't coincided immediately meaning the Wanderers will enter Saturday night's derby against Sydney FC searching for their first win under their new coach.
The best won't come in the short-term, Baccus says, while the club embarks on a long-term project midway through the season. The 26-year-old central midfielder says the squad has struggled in recent games with so much new information drilled into the players, but expects the benefits to start showing in time.
"It's taking in a lot of information over the last couple of weeks. We've taken in a lot ??? it's not exhausting, but it makes us flat in a way when we come up to our games," Baccus said. "It showed against Brisbane, we played well for the first 25 minutes but after that we were a little bit flat. Hopefully this week is a lot lighter week and hopefully we can refresh things up a bit and hopefully we can go."
Since Gombau's appointment a month ago, the Wanderers have transitioned from a style of closing down the middle of the park, playing compact to playing expansive football that attempts to stretch opponents open. Baccus admits such a drastic change was initially difficult for the players during a teething stage, but believes the free-flowing style will come to fruition early in the new year.
"It will take one or two months. But at the end of the day we don't have one or two months, we need to do well now. We need to do well for the fans," Baccus said. "It's definitely been a lot to take in over the last couple of weeks ... from what Popa [former coach Tony Popovic] brought through the club to Josep, it's two different extremes ... as players we need to adapt and if we don't adapt, I guess we won't be here."
