Phoenix wasn't at the races when it lost 3-0 at home to Sydney and Durante readily admitted that.
"We were really disappointing against Sydney," Durante said. "We had an early chance that Joel Griffiths just missed and I think if that went in it could have been a completely different ball game, and when they got their first goal they just they went from strength to strength.
"We just couldn't get ourselves in the game after that. We were trying to link passes that weren't on and maybe everyone was over-compensating and trying to play the impossible ball in an attempt to get us back in the game.
"We were second-best to everything and we're not hiding from the fact, but we're also not beating ourselves up too much over it.
"We've been playing some great football over the last month or so and the confidence level is sky high.
"As long as we take the lessons out of last week's game and don't repeat the mistakes against Victory, we can get straight back to playing the way we were.
"If you're going to have a setback, better now than when the finals start."
The loss cut Phoenix's competition lead to just one point and now it is under pressure to hang on in the top-of-the-table clash with Victory at Westpac Stadium.
"We're still extremely confident," Durante added. "We've been on an extremely good run overall - we won four games straight before last weekend.
"We've got a huge belief in the style we're playing and we know that if we stick to the game plan we're going to win more games than we lose.
"Every team has had its issues at some stage this season and the fact is when it happens to your team you haven't got much time to dwell on it.
"We've looked at the video and we know where we can improve and now we're on to the next game.
"We've got four games left and three of them are at home, so we're in the box seat to finish extremely high - the highest spot in the club's history.
"It's exciting times and the guys are all feeling the buzz. The finals are around the corner and we've missed them the last couple of seasons, so it's nice to be in the mix again.
"Every game is very important now and we want to finish well enough to be playing finals at home."
Against Sydney, Wellington was missing numerous players who were away on international duty, including the team's leading goal-scorer, Nathan Burns, and fellow attacking ace Michael McGlinchey, but Phoenix coach Ernie Merrick didn't make excuses and neither does Durante.
"I don't think we can use the players who were missing as an excuse," he said. "The four main starters who were missing are quality players, but we've probably got enough depth now at the Phoenix and a good-enough squad to at least make a better account of ourselves."
Phoenix was scrappy at the back and didn't handle set-piece situations well against Sydney. Durante says they have worked hard on getting back to their normal, very competent selves in that area against Victory.
"We pride ourselves this year on being defensively sound and especially on set pieces," he said.
"We work quite a bit on defending set pieces and to concede those goals that were scrappy was not who we are.
"We weren't comfortable on any set piece last weekend, which was disappointing. We've done some more stuff on that this week to make sure we're a lot tighter against Victory."
The last time Phoenix and Victory met - on 1 March in Melbourne - Victory paid the price for missing a plethora of first-half chances by going down 3-2.
"I thought it was a classic game of one team taking their chances and the other team not taking their chances," Durante said.
"We've been on the receiving end of that sort of result a few times this year as well, when we've dominated games but not taken our chances and lost or drawn the game.
"We showed tremendous character to come from behind twice away from home and get what was our first-ever away win against Victory.
"That will boost our confidence going into Sunday's game - knowing we can compete with them."
