Sabah hope to end unlucky streak – coach

KOTA KINABALU: The State football under-19 squad are looking to turn their luck around when they host Group B rivals Selangor in the Youth Cup League match at the Penampang Stadium, today.

The match kicks off at 4.15pm and presents a chance for Sabah to end their losing streak of four matches.

Head coach Billyton Vun Kit Ming hoped there would be improvement in the team's performance especially in defence, which had been exploited by opponents.

“We were humbled by the 4-1 defeat to Perak in our last match. The team played well but lost focus in certain situations.

“We give our best effort in every match but our defence has been a problem for us lately and the opponents have been exploiting it,” he said when contacted here, yesterday.

“We made efforts to remedy this weakness in our training sessions. I hope the players will show improvement so that we can get a second win to end the run of our poor form,” Billyton added.

Sabah are currently second from the bottom in the Group B 11-team standings. After six games, they have only three points from the victory in their second match, while others ended in defeat.

On paper, Selangor are the better side by virtue of being in sixth spot on eight points from two wins and two draws.

But they also lost 2-1 to Perak in their last match on April 3 and Billyton sees them as an equal match for his side to try and turn things around.

“The players will go into this match with some confidence. If they play well it could give us some points to try and improve our position in the standings,” he said.