Zaccheroni says goalless result against Saudi Arabia was fair

Abu Dhabi: The UAE’s Italian coach Alberto Zaccheroni was of the view that the goalless result against Saudi Arabia in the Gulf Cup was “fair” given the fact that both sides gave as good as they got until the end.

The UAE now face a must-win situation against hosts Kuwait on Thursday to ensure a semi-final berth after being level with Saudi Arabia on four points at the top of Group A each going into the final round.

“We dominated the first half and were very effective in the second despite being unable to score against Saudi. I’m satisfied with the performance of the team and there is improvement from the previous game against Oman,” said Zaccheroni, adding that the players despite the lack of time between the matches have adjusted well and were overall in good shape.

“I made some changes in the second half and that was to give some breather to some of the players who I felt were tiring and it was also [in] search for a victory.”

Zaccheroni chose to bring in Ismail Al Hammadi in place of Mohamed Abdul Rahman to add impetus to the UAE squad in the second half.

However, that couldn’t yield dividends in terms of goals. With Jazira’s ace forward Ahmed Khalil still warming the bench, questions were raised why Zaccheroni choose not to unleash the former early in search of a goal.

Khalil came on for Ali Mabkhout in the 84th minute and he made little impact in the time remaining. Al Ain midfielder Ahmed Barman was also introduced late in the 87th minute in place of Mohamed Fawzi.

“I pushed Hammadi to give momentum to the attack in the second half so that we can get those three points. I followed him with Khalil and Berman and all these changes were in order to win those three points,” said Zaccheroni, who cleared the air on Khalil’s delayed entry saying that the forward was held back because he is still not 100 per cent fit and he wanted to only use him for a final push towards the end.

Khalil, however, was disappointed with the team’s showing and felt that they have their task cut out in the next match against hosts Kuwait, who lost their outing against Oman 1-0 later in the evening.

“The task has become difficult for us but we must skip this blues. To me frankly this result is not satisfying. I think we have made things difficult for ourselves in the next game against Kuwait and they will also have public support. But this is football and we will have to get past Kuwait to qualify,” said Khalil, adding that the team were playing exactly as the coach wanted and that everyone would be ready to do their best to win against Kuwait in the next match.

UAE goalkeeper Khalid Eisa was of the view that Saudi played a strong match and the UAE’s inability to create chances came to the fore.

“The Saudi team played a big game and we had some problem to create scoring opportunities despite being on the offensive for the most part. Hopefully the coach will be able to solve it in the next match,” said Eisa.

Defender Juma was of the view that the team needs to forget the result against Saudi quickly. “We have to forget the draw and think about the next outing. We need to look towards Kuwait straightaway,” said Juma.

Midfielder Khamis Esmaeel felt that the result was “positive and negative” at the same time.

“We hope that we will adjust well and win against Kuwait. We did not register goals against Saudi even though we create opportunities and this is negative. We have to make sure we win against Kuwait any way,” he said.

Saudi Arabia’s Croatian coach Krunoslav Jurcic congratulated his players for implementing the game plan exactly as he asked them to.

He praised the collective effort from his players and hailed the performance of midfielder Nouh Al Mousa, whom he rated was a strong candidate to find a place in the team for the World Cup in Russia.

“My goal of the tournament is clear, to do well in every game and to win or at least equalise, especially as the team includes a group of young players. At the same time the qualification to the second round has become my next goal.

“Before the tournament I did not know the performance of the players, but after two games in the tournament I’m optimistic that we will achieve something significant from this tournament,” said Jurcic, who side will have to beat Oman next on Thursday to cement a place in the semis.