Sport | Football
Coaches laugh off 'playing for draw'
The coaches of Group B co-leaders Saudi Arabia and Iraq laughed off speculations that their teams will play out a draw to jointly advance to the semifinals of the Gulf Cup Championship.
- By M. Satya Narayan, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:36 May 3, 2009
Abu Dhabi: The coaches of Group B co-leaders Saudi Arabia and Iraq laughed off speculations that their teams will play out a draw to jointly advance to the semifinals of the Gulf Cup Championship.
"Yes we have already reached an understanding," said Saudi Arabia's coach Marcos Paqueta, slamming all those spreading such rumours.
"It is impossible in football to think of such things. Please, do have respect for the players, the teams and the competition," the Brazilian said.
"The level of all teams in this group has been almost the same and proof of that is until now no team is sure of reaching the semifinals," Paqueta said at the pre-match press conference.
"We are here to win this group and we will go all out to achieve that," said Paqueta. Iraqi coach Akram Ahmad Salman echoes Paqueta's sentiment on playing for a draw.
"Many of my supporters raised this question when we drew against Bahrain. It is amazing how people view results. We just cannot oblige others nor play in such a way," said Akram.
"My aim is to qualify and it does not matter whether the teams does it with a win or a draw. We are more keen on providing the smiles to our 50 million people back home and for that we take each match at a time," he said.
"Most of the professionals in my team are yet to settle down with the others and there are still some areas of weakness. But we will improve with each game and will do our best against the Saudis," said the Iraqi coach.
Later in the afternoon, the coaches of Bahrain and Qatar also said that they did not believe that the group's leaders will play for a draw.
"However we do not have any control on that match. We have to win and we will try to do just that," said Bosnian Kresso Senad, who took over from Hans Peter Breigel.
Qatar's coach Dzemaluddin Musovic said his young team had still a lot to learn.
"Against Saudi Arabia, they went into defence after scoring in the 10th minute. They have to learn that you can't defend for 80 minutes," he added.
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