Dubai: The UAE’s Brazilian coach Gustavo Henrique [Guga] was left searching for answers following his team’s embarrassing 4-3 loss to minnows Morocco in their opener of the Fourth Samsung Beach Soccer Inter-Continental Cup late on Tuesday.
Trailing the North Africans 0-3 at the end of the second period, the UAE did well to fight back and equalise midway through the final period. But skipper Nassim Al Hadaoui rounded up a well-deserved hat-trick with a superb volley with 3.23 minutes remaining for the final whistle.
Guga, who took over the UAE beach soccer national squad in April this year, was left searching for answers following this loss to an unheralded opponent. “This is a match that we were supposed to win. There can be no excuses for this defeat. We created the chances, but simply could not convert our superiority on the pitch,” Guga said.
“Before we knew it, we were already three goals down. And we all know how tough it can be to fight back from such a deficit. But we did fight back and then that fourth goal from Nassim killed us. We cannot afford to repeat such a performance against the more technical teams like Portugal and Iran,” the Brazilian cautioned.
The UAE was next scheduled to take on Iran late on Wednesday followed by their final group engagement against Portugal on Thursday. Only the top two teams will advance to the semi-finals. “Two tough games against quality teams doesn’t make our task any easier. We need to create the chances and score and we have to look for this edge in our next two matches. If we play to our potential we can do it,” Guga said.
