The national men’s football team assistant coach Stuart Watkiss believes Bangladesh can beat Afghanistan in their opening group match in the 2022 World Cup Asia Qualifiers in Tajikistan on September 10. He expressed his expectation and the opponent’s playing style after their training session at the Bangabandhu National Stadium on Sunday.
“I and Jamie (Day) have seen some of their games. They are bigger and stronger than us. The three midfielders are their best three players. The games we saw they were playing with one central striker with 4-3-3 formation. They have one really strong central defender. The full-backs don’t really attack too much to support. We can beat them but we have to play well. It will not be easy.” said the English coach.
Booters start practice https://t.co/1dWIF5ZMHV
— Dhaka Tribune Sports (@Sport_DT) August 24, 2019
The 53-year-old coach, who worked mainly with the defence, hinted to go with a different formation during the tough fixtures in the WC qualifiers while reminded about Abahani’s recent win over North Korean champions April 25 SC in the first leg of AFC Cup Inter-zone semifinal.
“May be we will play with a different formation during the game against really a strong team. We played five defenders when we played the U-23 team in Bahrain. We spoke about playing five defenders and this is something we will look out. But we have not made any final decision yet.” added Stuart.
Goalkeeping coach Bobby Mimms had an illustrious playing career in the English Premier League as he was the main goalkeeper of 1995 EPL winner Blackburn Rovers in the early 1990s. He was the goalkeeping coach of Bahrain in 2014 before moving to EPL outfits West Ham United as the same coaching role. The 55-year-old made Bangladesh debut during the World Cup pre-qualification play-offs against Laos in June.
Bangladesh’s preparation for the upcoming World Cup 2022 and Asian Cup 2023 joint qualifier against Afghanistan, scheduled for September 10, began Friday as the 26 footballers reported at a city hotel.https://t.co/wCb1nVteRP#FOOTBALL #BANGLADESH #BANGLADESHFOOTBALL #BFF #WC
— Dhaka Tribune Sports (@Sport_DT) August 23, 2019
Bobby talked about his goalkeepers after the first three days of training. “The Afghanistan will be a little bit tougher opposition. Technically all three goalkeepers have everything in place, they have the technical ability. We will put tactical side into them so that they know what they are going to face when we play Afghanistan. We are confident the goalkeeper that will be fixed will be performing well.”
