Hemantha Vincent Biswas was hailed as the next superstar from Bangladesh on Monday after his 40th minute strike against Sri Lanka was enough for the hosts to move into the semi-finals of the Bangabandhu Gold Cup. The Serbian coach of Sri Lanka, Nikola Kavazovic, labelled Hemantha as the future Bangladesh star after watching him scoring the goal that threw his team out of the tournament.
‘I told before in an interview that Biswas (Hemantha) is the biggest potential of Bangladesh football,’ said the Lankan team coach.
‘The current generation will be finished in two to three years time — but he is the next Mamunul Islam.’
Bangladesh coach Lodewijk de Kruif, who has no doubts about the talent of Hemantha, said Hemantha played like a star despite he is only 18-year old.
‘We have good qualities in the team for instance —Hemanta,’ said De Kruif. ‘He is very young guy but he played like a matured man.’
De Kruif believes that the young attacking midfielder will take Bangladesh to an upper level with his talent.
‘We must be very happy because Bangladesh have a player like him,’ he said.
‘This is a guy with big promise. I’m happy with him.’
De Kruif was also happy to see his players dominating the match from start till the end.
‘Today’s match, you see there was only one team playing football and that was Bangladesh,’ said Kruif.
‘We created a lot of chances. I’m very happy the way we played.’
Sri Lanka coach Kavazovic gave credit to the home side for playing a one-sided match.
‘We lost because simply we couldn’t have played better than this,’ said Kavazovic.
‘They [Bangladesh] played faster than last time, they were physically better and they were also ahead on one-on-one situations.’
Kavazovic again mentioned the way of the goal what scored by Hemantha.
‘We didn’t allow Bangladesh to create one single chance. But they scored a masterpiece,’ he said.
‘If they played against Japan today, they would score the same way.’
Hemantha, who attended a trial in Dutch club FC Twente, was humbled by all praises.
‘I was awarded the number 10 shirt in my debut match against India in Goa. I’m really happy for proving the coach’s decision right,’ said the Sheikh Russell Krira Chakra midfielder.
‘I had three more opportunities but I couldn’t score which I regret.’
-With New Age input
