Day has his plans set for Afghanistan
While Bangladesh’s four opponents in Group E of Joint Qualifiers for the World Cup and the Asian Cup were busy playing their opening matches on Thursday night, the men in red and green completed their final preparation match in Tajikistan ahead of their opening match against Afghanistan.
Neighbours India gave Oman a run for their money, but eventually surrendered a first-half lead in a 2-1 defeat while group favourites and current Asian Cup champions Qatar humiliated Afghanistan with a massive 6-0 win in Doha.
Following their 1-1 draw in the second practice match against CSKA Pamir, Bangladesh coaching staff including head coach Jamie Day tried to watch the Afghanistan-Qatar match, but failed to do so as there was no live-streaming of that match available at the team hotel. However, the coach must have managed information regarding that match in a bid to know details about their first two opponents, especially about Afghanistan who they will face on September 10 in Tajikistan.
Day believes the heavy defeat for Afghanistan against Qatar will not have an impact on their game against Bangladesh.
“I don’t think the defeat [of Afghanistan] last night will have much impact as they played against very a good team in Qatar and no one would have expected them [Afghanistan] to win,” the Bangladesh coach said yesterday.
Afghanistan coach Anoush Dastgir, however, was understandably disappointed with the result but vowed to come back strong in the match against Bangladesh.
“Despite the big defeat, I’m proud with what the players showed today as they gave their best and hopefully, we will learn from the mistakes before our next game against Bangladesh,” Dastgir was quoted as saying by AFC website.
Under the guidance of Day, Bangladesh have been playing counter-attacking football, keeping the defence solid. However, Bangladesh conceded three goals and gave away one penalty in the last two practice matches against club teams despite the same defence helping them keep cleansheet in the last three international matches against Laos and Cambodia.
“There is nothing to worry about. The defence is fine but we will need to be organsied and have good shape throughout the qualifiers,” opined Day, whose side on Thursday struggled to maintain the defensive line during transition periods against CSKA Pamir.
Day, however, found some positives from the two practice matches. “It was another good match and pleased again with the performance. There were lots of positives to take from the two games. The boys passed the ball well, the shape was good and every player got some game time.”
Assistant coach Stuart Watkiss said they now have plenty of information to select the starting eleven against Afghanistan.
“We had good workout and to be fair there were two good games against two Tajikistan Premier League teams. We got plenty of information through these two games to select the team. Now, Jamie and the coaching staff will sit down to talk about it. We have 3-4 days left to build the team for the big match against Afghanistan,” Watkiss said in a video message.