The Bangladesh Football Federation is yet to finalise the schedule of national team’s two warm-up matches for preparation of the World Cup qualifiers after Afghanistan asked them to host the match on June 2 instead of June 4. BFF also had a discussion with the Singapore Football Association to host their national team to play another warm-up match. But the SFA informed BFF that they can only play the match if the BFF can host it on May 30.
The national team coach Lodewijk de Kruif claimed if those two games are arranged in that period, it would be very difficult for the players to recover physically within such a short time.
‘Afghanistan can’t play on June 4 and they want to play on June 2,’ said the Dutchman.
‘Singapore want to play on May 30th. My concern is that, it is not enough to recover within 48 hours.
‘My target is to play matches with my main team. I have to build them up again in the right way. First thing is not to pick injuries, so they need rest.’
Kruif, who came to Bangladesh on April 28 to observe the national players’ performances in the ongoing Bangladesh Premier League, also expressed his disappointment to
see his charges were not in good shape.
‘I had expected the level of Sheikh Jamal and Sheikh Russell players were better. But now I see that they are physically and mentally fatigued,’ said the coach.
‘See the captain [Mamunul Islam] is in problem, Meshu [Atiqur Rahman] is in problem. All kinds of small things are coming.
‘There is something I don’t know because I cannot look inside the club.’
Kruif wants to see his main players recover from different injures before the camp starts.
The camp is likely to begin from May 17 or 18 as the BFF has decided to start the camp in Savar four to five days ahead of the scheduled date of May 23.
Kruif also yelled at the poor pitch of the Bangabandhu National Stadium as he believes the players got injured due to playing in that hard surface.
‘We need a good pitch because we are Bangladeshi. We are not big, we are short. In the past, we played in long passes like England.
‘When you are short, don’t play long passes. You must need a good pitch to play in short passes but the pitch is in terrible shape at the moment to do that,’ said an annoyed Kruif.
He was also impressed with the current form of former national and present Muktijoddha Sangsad forward Enamul Haque. Enamul is currently the leading scorer of the league with seven goals.
‘I had a private conversation with him [Enamul]. He is a very fine and good guy. He just cannot stop scoring for his club now. So this is also a good news for the national team’, said Kruif.
Abahani’s midfield duo of Shahedul Alam and Emon Babu are also in Kruif’s good book along with Sheikh Russell defender Rezaul Karim Reza.
Kruif is now preparing a 51-member preliminary squad to submit to FIFA by May 10.
-With New Age input
