Dubai: Al Nasr coach Ivan Jovanovic branded Tuesday’s 1-0 home win over Al Dhafra as the perfect way to enter a month-long break in league fixtures.
Mahmoud Khamis’ last gasp wonder goal from range settled an otherwise tepid encounter in Oud Mehta, enabling the Blue Wave to consolidate top four status ahead of a window for cup and international games.
“We have a lot of time in front of us now to work on our mistakes and improve,” said the Serbian. “It’s always better to work in a positive atmosphere, and this only comes after a victory.
“There are some games that are decided by individual efforts. We had patience and in the end one individual action won it for us.
“I believe it was one of the best goals I’ve seen in this league. I didn’t really believe that Mahmoud’s shot would make it but now I’m sure he took the best decision.”
Al Dhafra coach Ion Marin said he didn’t blame his players for the loss as the winning shot was unstoppable. Instead he encouraged his team to use the defeat as a catalyst to return stronger after the break. “Sometimes football is not fair,” said the Romanian, who recently replaced Bosnia’s Anel Karabeg as coach. “In my opinion Al Nasr were supposed to lose today.
“The shot was unstoppable so you can’t blame it on focus or concentration. You need to identify the real issues.
“We’ve had good progress lately and even though we lost today we shouldn’t stop, we have to continue in order to have better progress later on.
“We have a break in games now and this gives us the chance to prepare for the second quarter of the season.”
