Bangladesh girls made a flying start in their inaugural match of the 2019 AFC U-16 Women's Championship qualification beating Bahrain 10-0 but they expect a much stiffer challenge today when they face Lebanon at Bir Sherestha Shaheed Shipahi Mostafa Kamal Stadium.
Bangladesh are pitted in group F of the first qualification round along with Lebanon, United Arab Emirates, Vietnam and Bahrain. The top team in the group will qualify for the second stage of the qualification round.
The Bangladesh U-16 side, which has been getting frequent success recently in the international arena, is termed as favourites in their home ground but Lebanon are currently on top of the table with two dominant victories.
The middle-eastern side thrashed Bahrain 8-0 in their first match before picking up a comfortable 6-3 win against the UAE in their next match.
With those results Lebanon, who is yet to face Bangladesh in the age-level international matches, put them on top of the points table and Bangladesh coach Golam Rabbani Choton was aware of their strength.
“Most importantly they are on top now. We have to play well to beat them. We got plenty of goals in our first match but we also missed quite a few. We cannot afford to miss our chances today,” Choton said at a press conference yesterday.
Bangladesh are yet to play any morning games under the scorching sun while their opponents have already played one in similar conditions but the coach was confident as his charges practiced for such situations.
“We have been practicing in the morning sessions and we observed the videos of Lebanon. We are fully prepared for the game. We cannot afford to make mistakes today”, he added.