Pak football coach upbeat about Olympic qualifiers

LAHORE: Head coach Pakistan football team Jose A Nogueira believes that with a balanced team, he has strong hope of his charges doing wonders in the upcoming qualifiers.“I have high hopes with my boys, we have a balanced squad which has started to prepare for mission World Cup Qualifiers.”

“We have enjoyed day one training and with every day passing there will be improvement and different combinations developed,” Jose A Nogueira from Bahrain said in a message to The News. The green shirts are in Bahrain for the preparation of two-legged first round of 2022 FIFA World Cup Pre-Qualifiers against Cambodia in the next month, June. The head coach has termed it challenging as the Cambodia has shown reasonable progress in the last few years. “We are not taking Cambodia as an easy target, they are playing good football for the last few years, but my teams moral is high and they are ready to take the challenge,” the coach added.

The Brazilian Coach, supported by Marcello Costa goal keeper coach and Beto Portella the physical trainer, both from Brazil as well, has claimed that a good work plan is already prepared for the side for the challenge against hardworking Cambodia, “we have already made our plan how to proceed with the preparations of team, we realize that Cambodia is a very hardworking side” the coach said.

Before flying out for Cambodia to play away-leg in Phnom Penh Olympic Stadium, Phnom Pen on June 6, matches against some local clubs in Bahrain are also planned, told by well-informed sources. Pakistan will play its 2nd leg on June11.

The head coach Nogueira has also disclosed that the foreign-based Pakistani players are in good shape and can make potential difference, “in fact the green squad is a good mixture of foreign-based and local players” the head coach said.

No doubt Pakistan has stayed away from international football circuit for the last almost 4 years since the turmoil in Pakistan’s football in 2015, started with the interference by the previous regime to bring in its own supported people to take over PFF with the exception of few months in 2018 when Pakistan national team shared the football field in Asian Games in Jakarta and SAFF Cup in Dhaka, said an official of Faisal Saleh led PFF.

Amazingly the performance of the team was worth mentioning despite the gap of several years. Unfortunately, the progressing Pakistan team was once again stopped in the end of December 2018 due to a change in PFF on the court orders and In result of the elections held thereafter, the body elected was never accepted by the international football family, meaning by, having no international recognition they don’t have the right to participate in an international event held under FIFA auspices or under Olympics charter while FIFA, AFC and all other international football governing authorities only recognize Faisal Lead PFF, he added.