Dubai: UAE coach Mahdi Ali is hoping to make amends for his side’s third-place finish in the Gulf Cup with a last-four spot in the Asian Cup.
The Whites failed to defend their GCC title in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, in November after a 3-2 semi-final defeat to the hosts, before they beat Oman 1-0 in the third-place play-off.
They now hope to make up for it in Australia in the event, which begins on Friday, when they will face Gulf Cup champions Qatar, Bahrain and the highest-ranked Asian nation Iran in Group C.
“The Asian Cup is more of a priority than the Gulf Cup,” Ali told media before departing for Australia last month. “And, over the last week, I have received three or four calls from players assuring me that they are fully motivated for the Asian Cup. It’s a good sign that they want to do better.
“The ultimate target has always been getting to the 2018 Fifa World Cup and our second target is to get to the last four in Australia.
“Our first game against Qatar will be key, as it will decide the path of the team. There are no easy teams in football and sometimes I give a higher priority to playing the smaller teams because players can be relaxed, thinking it will be easy. If you enter a match complacent it might be too late.”
Al Ain midfielder Omar Abdul Rahman was the UAE’s outstanding injury concern held over from the Gulf Cup, but UAE Football Association President Yousuf Al Sarkal said the squad now has a clean bill of health.
“We had some problems with Omar being injured,” said Al Sarkal. “But he is continuing to recover and should be ready to join official matches. In general, we have passed this problem and don’t have any more injuries.
“It was very hard for us not to make the final in the Gulf Cup but now we are here [in the Asian Cup] we hope that we will make our mark on the tournament and bring happiness to our fans.
“We have been wishing for so many years to get to the top of Asia and, if not the summit, we want the UAE team to be one of the best. This is one of the goals we have been working on from junior level to the first team.
“We are currently ranked fifth out of 45 Asian countries but we want to be inside the top three.
“Through this participation we wish to pass the primary stages up to fourth position and above, but we will have to take it step by step.
“Our group is not that easy, which makes it difficult. Iran is currently the highest-ranked team in Asia and Qatar are the recent Gulf Cup champions. But I have full confidence in the technical ability of the team and only hope we aren’t affected by other factors.
“Our first priority is to pass the group stage and make it into the last eight, after that we can start thinking about the latter stages.”
