Hodak: Simple mistakes cost us dearly
mistakes have once again haunted the Under-19 national side, and they now face the bleak prospect of returning home early from the Asian Football Confederation Under-19 Championship in Indonesia.
National Under-19 coach Bojan Hodak faces this spectre after seeing his charges gifted two goals to Tajikistan despite managing to get back into the match in the second half to notch their first point in the championship.
According to Hodak, they need to work on their weaknesses if they are to advance to the quarter-finals.
“In terms of tactics and technical aspects, Tajikistan are really good and we knew what we had to do, but sadly the players made mistakes while defending and it cost us dearly.
“Such mistakes should not happen especially at such a level where we are playing against some of the continent’s best teams. On the penalty we conceded, I do not know what really happened and I will have to watch the video replays of the match, but in my opinion, our defence made a technical error and we paid the price for it.
“On Tajikistan’s second goal, there were at least seven to eight players in the penalty box but none of them even tried to close the gaps and they just waited there instead of doing more to shut the opposition out.
“Whatever it is, the players did perform much better after being able to rest and actually both teams had the chance to win the match. For me, a 2-2 draw is a fair result,” said Hodak at the postmatch press conference.
During the match at the Chandrabhaga Patriot Stadium in Bekasi on Tuesday, the inability of the young national squad to beat their opponents means that they will have to endure a difficult path to qualify for the quarterfinals. In their first Group D match, against mighty Saudi Arabia, they went down 2-1 and after being held to a draw by Tajikistan, Hodak’s boys now face the bleak prospect of going out of the championship at the group stage.
They will have to win comfortably against their next opponents, China tomorrow at the Pakansari Stadium in Cibinong, in their third and final group match, while hoping that the Saudis can do them a favour by beating Tajiskistan, if they are to have any hopes of advancing to the quarter-finals.