Taking on Geelong on Saturday with a chance to close the gap to the NPL 3’s top two sides, the Suns instead saw that buffer widen after a 2-1 defeat away from home.
GV was trailing 2-1 early in the second half, but despite having a vast majority of possession, a player advantage for the last 22 minutes and a plethora of shots. the Suns could not complete the comeback.
“It is obviously disappointing to lose the game,” Carley said.
“In terms of how the game panned out, we certainly had enough possession and enough chances to win the game, but it just didn’t work out at the key moments. We didn’t take our chances and they took theirs.
“Certainly it is a bit of a let down, it is a game that we fully expected to go in and win. Even rewatching the game a couple of times, it is a game we should have won.
“But if you don’t take chances at this level, teams will punish you. And that is exactly what Geelong did.”
The home side took the lead in the 38th minute, before Harun Aktas brought GV level on the stroke of half-time with his first goal of the season.
But Geelong had its advantage restored five minutes into the second half, before defending resiliently to hold on to the three points.
“I certainly can’t fault the boys’ effort or desire, but we have to be a little bit more ruthless if we want to achieve what we have set out to achieve this year,” Carley said.
“We certainly piled on the pressure, in terms of possession, we had 70 per cent possession for the whole game. We certainly pushed for it, we prodded and poked, but probably didn’t test their keeper enough for my liking.”
The Suns have run a tight ship down back this season, but Carley said he was frustrated by the manner in which the Suns conceded against Geelong
“Defensively I think we have been quite solid, although in saying that, the goals we conceded on the weekend were very, very poor,” he said.
“One was straight from a goal kick that ran through. We missed a one-on-one and literally 30 seconds later the ball is in the back of our net.
“The second one, following our corner, the guy has lobbed our keeper from 60 yards. They were really disappointing goals to concede.”
Down the other end of the pitch, the Suns gaffer said his side simply didn’t make the most of its opportunities on goal.
“We have to be more ruthless around the final third,” Carley said.
“At the moment I think we are relying a little bit too much on (leading scorer) Russell Currie to score all our goals and we need other people to stand up and be accountable That is something we will be working on moving forward this week.
“In total we had 19 shots on goal, but we have to be taking more chances or at least testing the keeper a little bit more than what we did. We have to be burying more than one goal in the game.”
The result means the Suns have remained in fourth spot on the table, but the gap to league leader and their next opponent Melbourne Victory has grown to eight points.
“We want to be staying with those top teams and I think on the weekend we let ourselves down a little bit and dragged ourselves into a mid-table dogfight when really we want to be pushing for those promotion spots,” Carley said.
“We look forward to this week, we have Melbourne Victory, who are on top of the table, so it is a great opportunity again to get back in the mix.”
Meanwhile, the Suns are one win away from reaching the national stage of the Australia Cup following a dramatic win over Whittlesea Rangers last Tuesday night.
Reduced to 10 players just before half-time following a Geordie Lelliott red card, a second-half hat-trick from Currie had the Suns continue their cup run with an enthralling 3-1 win.
With a chance to reach the Australia Cup Round of 32 for the first time within reach, Carley said there was plenty of excitement about the club.
“There is a great buzz around the place at the moment – not just with the cup competition, but just in general,” he said.
“Obviously to have a good cup run is brilliant, hopefully the draw for this round can be favourable to us too and it would be absolutely huge if we were to make the national stage.
“For me, it would be the biggest accomplishment of our history. Hopefully we can do that.”