EXCLUSIVE: Juan Mata once 'made life difficult' for Alex Wilkinson. The Spaniard could be a thorn in his side again

Manchester United legend Juan Mata is finally showing his class in the A-League after a difficult introduction last season when he made the move Down Under to much fanfare to play for the Western Sydney Wanderers.

The Wanderers never really figured out how to unlock one of the most talented players ever to play in Australia's domestic league and he was shipped off at the end of the season, joining the Melbourne Victory.

It hasn't taken long for the Spaniard, now 37, to find his feet in Melbourne and he will be central to the Victory's plans on Saturday night as they head to Sydney for the Big Blue at Allianz Stadium.

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Sydney FC's Head of Football Operations Alex Wilkinson played against Mata for the Socceroos against Spain in the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, so he is well equipped to point out the dangers in the attacking midfielder's arsenal, but he says the Sky Blues will be well up for the challenge on Saturday night.

Mata was 26 when he came face to face with Wilkinson, who was a late call-up for Australia, in the dead rubber group stage battle.

Spain were the reigning champions leading into the tournament, although a brutal 5-1 loss to the Netherlands in the first round followed by a 2-0 loss to Chile ended their title defence quickly.

Only one match remained for Spain after those two losses against Chile and the Dutch. That battle was against Australia.

The 2010 World Cup winners claimed their only victory at the tournament against the men in green and gold, with Mata scoring their third and final goal in the 81st minute.

Wilkinson remembers Mata being injected late in the second half in that match, with his brilliance off the ball only making it harderfor the Australian defender to do his job.

"They were best team in the world at the time," Wilkinson recalled, speaking with Wide World of Sports.

"They had won the previous World Cup and they won the Euros. The quality they sort of had it in their line up in general was unbelievable.

"They had players like Juan who were playing regularly in the Premier League and for the likes of Barcelona and Real Madrid. To just play a team like that was a wonderful experience.

"They had a lot of clever players who managed to find space and find time on the ball, which made our life pretty difficult ... especially me as a centre back."

Mata did not don the red and yellow jersey for almost 12 months after the World Cup, focusing his time on performing well for English giants Manchester United.

His departure from United in 2022 was followed by one-year contracts at Galatasaray in Turkey and Vissel Kobe in Korea. He then landed in the A-League in 2024.

Even though it has been over a decade since Wilkinson faced Mata in Brazil, he could not hide his awe that the Spaniard is still in form all these years later.

"It's great to see him doing well in the A-League," Wilkinson said.

"Obviously last year at Wanderers didn't go according to plan for him and he probably didn't get to show his quality as much as he would've liked, but it's been completely different since he went down to Melbourne.

"He is contributing at an extremely high level, he hasn't slowed down ... if anything he is winding back the clock and showing the form that put him among the best players in the world and in the best teams in the world.

"It's great to have him in the league and to have him in form but this week, we hope he's a little bit off his game because it's gonna be a difficult one."

The Sky Blues got the upper hand over Victory in their first clash of the season last November, recording a triumphant 3-0 win. But just two months later Sydney FC were thrashed 4-0 on Victory's home turf.

Victory found the back of the net six times in that match but were denied twice by VAR - both goals that Mata set up.

"It's about not just concentrating on (shutting down Mata), we obviously have a game plan for the whole team," said Wilkinson.

"In the back of your mind you've gotta be aware of quality players and and not giving them too much time to be able to hurt you.

"Victory have some quality all over the park. Juan is very good at finding the spaces between them (to get them on the board).

"You don't have time to dwell on past results too much, but we will look at we need to improve on from that last game (against Victory) and implement that.

"It's always a game that Victory get up for you, it is one of our two biggest games of the year. The rivalry is only getting stronger and stronger over the years."

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Given the past two results, the former Socceroos star is expecting the clash will be a "highly entertaining, high scoring game".

However, for the sake of table position, he hopes it will be a narrow victory.

"The league has been so incredibly tight this year," he said.

"Wellington are last at the moment and they're only six points outside the final spots. That's only two wins.

"It just goes to show that if a team if you can put together a couple of wins in a row you can really change the trajectory season, but at the same time if you lose a couple in a row you can all of a sudden drop out of (finals contention) very, very quickly.

"We by no means are thinking that we will (definitely) qualify for the finals. But we do want to win the league and we want to qualify for Asia."

Sydney will host Mata and his Melbourne Victory teammates on Saturday, March 7 at Allianz Stadium. Kick off will take place at 7.35pm AEDT.