Rostyn Griffiths is looking for more following his first start for the Central Coast Mariners.

The 22-year old midfielder made his full debut for the Gosford club in their 2-0 loss to Wellington Phoenix on Sunday and admitted that it was not the ideal way to start with his new club from a team point of view although he was content with his individual performance.

"Yeah I was looking forward to it. I'd been patient throughout the pre-season waiting for my chance and while it wasn't the game I would have been hoping for it's always nice to get your place and like I say disappointing we didn't get the win but I was happy to start," he said.

"It's a very tough place to go (Wellington), they've got good individual players and it's mentally tough as well with the time difference and the travel and the fans, and everything like that, but we have to be prepared for that as well and we knew what we were coming up against."

The Mariners are away again this weekend but on this occasion will be much closer to home as their round 4 fixture is against Sydney FC at the Sydney Football Stadium.

Griffiths is aware the reigning champions have not kicked off their title defence in a positive fashion but is remaining cautious ahead of the encounter with the Sky Blues.

"They haven't had the best start to the season and a few of their best players are out as well, so if there is ever a good time to play them now is that time. We need to prove ourselves, and prove that we can play better football than we did last week, and there's no better time to do it than in a derby against Sydney," he added.

"We had a decent start against Melbourne Heart and we came back in the second half against Adelaide so we need to keep up there at the top of the table because I think that is where we deserve to be this season.

"We've got a decent squad, brought in some decent players and a decent coach, so we definitely want to be back winning this weekend."