Sanchez hails Qatari supporters

Qatar coach Felix Sanchez insisted his team felt the backing of the home crowd despite supporters leaving in droves in the second half of their 2-0 defeat by Ecuador on the World Cup's opening night.

The Al Bayt Stadium had been a riot of noise and colour during the opening ceremony and even during the firsthalf,butennervalencia’s doubleclearlypuncturedthe enthusiasmofthehomefans, and with 10 minutes to go the stadiumwasvirtuallyempty.

Sanchez was asked about the empty seats and said: “Truth be told, I have enough work to do to take a look at it. We felt backed and supported and we hope for the next game, people will feel prouder and keep supporting us to the end of the tournament.

“Theatmospherewasgreat, people were very much looking forward to this game.

“We knew (a defeat) could happen and the result can sometimes be difficult. We will try to learn from today and I’m sure we will make people feel more happy with our performance."

Qatar survived an early scare when semi-automated offside technology was deployed right at the start of the tournament to disallow a Valencia header for a marginal call against his strike partnermichaelestrada,but Valenciawasnottobedenied, scoring twice, once from the penalty spot, inside the first 35 minutes.

Sanchez said: “There’s no excuse, we want to congratulate our opponents, they deserved to win.

“There is a lot of room for improvement. Maybe the responsibilityandnervesgot the best of us. We didn’t start well. It was a terrible start actually.”