It’s all about the win for Senegal
SENEGAL coach Aliou Cisse said his team are expected to reach the World Cup knockout stages due to their status as African champions and his players are handling the pressure well.
Having reached the quarter-finals on their World Cup debut in 2002, Senegal were eliminated in the group stage on fair play points four years ago in Russia.
Senegal need to beat Ecuador in their final Group A game today to qualify for the last 16. They could still remain in contention with a draw, provided hosts Qatar beat three-time finalists the Netherlands.
“I come from a country where we don’t like losing,” Cisse said yesterday.
“We’re always hungry for that win. Not going to the round of 16 would be difficult to digest.
“We’re Okay, we’re dealing with the pressure and stress. For me, it’s good stress.”
Cisse’s side lost 2-0 to the Dutch but beat Qatar 3-1 to keep alive their hopes of advancing.
“We understand that winning will allow us to continue on the adventure and that’s exactly what we intend on doing,” Cisse said.
“We know in 2018 we were looking for a draw when maybe the points would play in our favour but this isn’t the case tomorrow.
“We’ve got a very strong and experienced team, they’re a welloiled machine. We’ve got the right mixture of veterans and players, players who are used to these types of challenges.”
The South Americans, meanwhile, are sweating on the fitness of captain Enner Valencia after he was carried off late in the Netherlands draw with a recurrence of a knee strain.
The 33-year-old forward has scored all three of Ecuador’s goals in Qatar, adding to the three he bagged in Brazil in 2014, and is key to their chances of reaching the knockout round for only the second time.
“I hope he won’t be playing tomorrow,” Cisse joked. “I don’t really know (Valencia) in particular but I can see that he is a warrior and he’ll want to be part of the team for a game like this.
“I think the whole Ecuadorean team is a great team, they are very aggressive and they defend well. I know that my team will be focused tomorrow.”
Ecuador made it to Qatar from one of the world’s toughest qualifying groups and have started superbly, but must only look forward, their coach said yesterday.
“Everything that we’ve done in the past will be useless tomorrow, it’s a totally different game,” coach Gustavo Alfaro said.
“We just want to win in order to qualify.”
The 44th-ranked South Americans beat World Cup hosts Qatar 2-0 before outplaying the Netherlands in a 1-1 draw to go joint top of Group A before today’s final game of the round.
Should they avoid defeat, they will match their all-time best World Cup showing when they reached the last-16 in 2006.
“I’m convinced we’ve done everything we can, we’ve done our homework.
“Hopefully tomorrow we will be strong and fortunate enough against Senegal, who are a great team, and hopefully we will go through, because we deserve it,” Alfaro added.