Assistant coach Ryan Campbell believes the Newcastle Jets are primed to put on a show at home after a well-timed competition break early in their season.
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The Jets opened their 2023-24 campaign with back-to-back road trips, beating Central Coast 1-0 at Gosford before succumbing 1-0 to Glory in Perth on October 22.
There were no A-League Women's fixtures last weekend due to an international window and Campbell said the coaching staff had welcomed some extra time to work with a new-look squad ahead of hosting winless Western Sydney in their first home game.
The 5.45pm match is the second of a club double-header with the men playing beforehand at 3pm. It is the only time the Jets women are scheduled to feature at McDonald Jones Stadium this season.
The majority of their home games will be played at No.2 Sportsground with three outings in Maitland.
"From the girls point of view, we really want those fans who come to the men's game to stay and support the girls," Campbell said.
"The girls loved the experience of the Mariners game [in front of 5735 spectators], so if we can get those fans to stay around and support us that would be awesome."
Attack has been a key focus since the Perth trip.
Hired gun Melina Ayres, who joined Newcastle from Melbourne Victory, scored the Jets' first goal of the season and again looked dangerous in Perth.
"We worked the girls really hard in pre-season, so it actually wasn't a bad thing for our ones to have a bit of a break over last weekend," Campbell said.
"We've been really focusing on our ability to score goals. Obviously, over the first two games, we've defensively been very strong, which was a big part of pre-season that we wanted to improve on from last year.
"We leaked too many goals last year, so we've been defensively quite strong.
"But, we've really wanted to make it a focus of ours that we're a team that dominates the game, scores lots of goals, is the team that goes out there and really wants to control the game.
"So, the two weeks has been a big focus on what we're going to do to score more goals."
Campbell expected "some selection problems" for the coaches with a full complement of players available and the starting XI not yet settled.
Centre-back Alex Huynh returns from suspension while 11-times capped Matildas left-back Gema Simon could also come back into calculations after being sidelined with a knee issue for the first two rounds.
"At this stage, I would say that we're still working it out," Campbell said.
"We've had young players like Emma Dundas and Zoe Karipidis come in and have really good games and put a lot of pressure on the senior players that are in the group."
The Wanderers lost 2-0 to Sydney then 3-0 to Wellington Phoenix in their first two outings but are set to be boosted by the inclusion of New Zealand international Milly Clegg.
"We recognise their results don't indicate how they've played so far," Campbell said.
"Last week against Wellington, they could have been up well before they went down, and they conceded three goals in 20 minutes as well."
Jets captain Cassidy Davis is poised to make a women's record 132nd appearance for the club. Remarkably, Davis has not missed a game since her debut 10 years ago.
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