Maclaren, Leckie spark big City ALM win

Socceroos striker Jamie Maclaren continued his red-hot scoring run and Matthew Leckie notched his first Australian league goal in more than 10 years as Melbourne City thrashed Newcastle 4-2 in A-League Men.

Despite the absence of head coach Patrick Kisnorbo who tested positive for COVID earlier on Tuesday, City barely missed a beat as assistant coach Petr Kratky ran the team.

Kisnorbo will also miss Friday's A League Men away game at Western Sydney.

The win lifted City four places to second, three points behind intra-city rivals Western United.

City's big guns all fired in the match at McDonald Jones Stadium, with Maclaren scoring twice, making it seven straight games across club and internationals in which he has scored.

Leckie and Florin Berenguer also got on the scoresheet while Andrew Nabbout, Aiden O'Neill and Connor Metcalfe were also prominent.

"The boys had a fantastic attitude," said Kratky, who revealed he was in contact with Kisnorbo through the game.

"We know Newcastle is a very good team in the attacking phase and we expected they would give us troubles when they have the ball, but we tried to control the game on the ball, which we did."

"The boys executed well and worked hard."

The visitors had most of the best chances in the first half but it took them 40 minutes to unlock the Newcastle defence.

Berenguer started with a fine cross-field ball to Nabbout, who beat one and produced a lovely back heel pass to Metcalfe.

The Socceroo cut the ball into the centre where Berenguer swept the ball towards the net with Jets' substitute Riley Warland, who had replaced injured captain Matthew Jurman, unable to stop it it from crossing the line.

The game was effectively settled by two goals in three minutes early in the