‘Day’s absence won’t impact us’

The Covid-19 positive case of Jamie Day may come as a big shock to the Bangladesh football team, but the players do not want to dwell on this issue as they prepare for tomorrow's second and final FIFA international friendly against Nepal.

Assistant coach Stuart Watkiss conducted the training session at the Bangabandhu National Stadium yesterday in absence of the head coach, who underwent a second test yesterday after testing positive on Saturday.

"I think Jamie's presence is very important for us because of the way he works with us. He has been helping us a lot from the beginning of the pandemic. We suddenly heard that he is Covid-19 positive and we really felt bad not seeing him around in training today," striker Mahbubur Rahman Sufil said after nearly two-hours' training at the BNS.

"I think his absence won't affect us. I hope he will work with us tomorrow (Monday) before the match," Sufil added.

Winger Saad Uddin, too, believes, Day's absence will not have an impact on the team. "The players are mentally strong and assistant coach Watkiss is communicating with Jamie and taking care of things in training," Saad said.

During training, Watkiss focused on areas where the players made mistakes in the first match. The forwards went through shooting practice from inside the box, with another player coming up as a back-up to tap in the rebounds in case the goalkeepers parried those efforts back. The booters also delivered crosses from the flanks and long passes from the midfield for the forwards to finish off the moves.

"We had passing practice because our passing in midfield was not good in the first match. The coach also discussed the matter in the meeting and showed the way we can improve the standard of passing in midfield and also asked us to increase our confidence. The assistant coach applied those things in practice today. Staying out of action for a long time was one of the reasons for the miss-passes while there was also lack of understanding among the players due to the long lay-off," said Saad, who believes Nepal will come strongly in the second match. 

"Nepal-Bangladesh matches have always been tough ones and these are 50-50 affairs. The fitness of Nepalese players was not bad as they played well in the second half. I think the next match will be more competitive because they have also prepared themselves better after the first match. I think the next match will be more exciting and interesting," said Saad, who provided the cross for Nabib Newaz Jibon to score the first goal.

Sufil also praised the way the forwards trained yesterday.

"Having shots on target with a player as back-up is really important because one must go forward to latch on to the rebounds. We lacked in this area in the first match and could not implement these things properly on the ground, which was the premise of the training today," said Sufil, who sealed off the victory in the first match with an eye-catching goal ten minutes from time.