REDEMPTION
Dollah is one of the few who have achieved success both as a player and coach, and he hopes to continue his impressive credentials by guiding Pahang to the FA Cup crown on Saturday.
The former international striker has attained success with every club that he coached, except for the mediocre season with Perlis in 2016.
Pahang’s entry into the FA Cup final has given Dollah some bragging rights as many had criticised him during his 15month tenure as the national coach, which ended with the embarrassing 10-0 thrashing by the United Arab Emirates in a World Cup Qualifying match in Abu Dhabi in Sept, 2015.
Although the hammering in Abu Dhabi still affects Dollah emotionally, he wants to put it behind him and focus on turning Pahang into a major force in the MLeague.
Dollah has challenged himself to help Pahang regain their glory days and overtake Darul Ta’zim as the top team in Malaysian football.
“Critics are everywhere. Sometimes they will still find reasons to criticise you even when your team are doing well. Frankly, I don’t care… they can say whatever they want about me,” said Dollah after the match.
“I just want to focus on Pahang. I want them to regain their glory days. People will forget you if you fail to win and that is why we must beat Kedah in the FA Cup final.
“Pahang have not achieved their maximum yet. We can get better. I think what we have achieved so far is remarkable as we only started serious preparations last December.”
On Saturday, though Pahang were impressive only in patches, they scored two goals from three chances. Negri dominated the second half and created 11 opportunities.
“The strategy against Negri was to get an early goal and we achieved it. But there were anxious moments after the break as my players did not follow my instructions.
“I told them during the break to play a disciplined game and also to support each other in defence and attack. However, they tried to play safe and defended. It only created problems for the team. We were lucky as Negri were poor in their finishing,” he said.