JEDDAH, 25 March 2005 — Saudi Arabia face a daunting task when they clash with South Korea today in a key Group A World Cup Asian Zone qualifier match in Dammam.
The urgency to deliver the full three points at this stage of the group matches need not be overemphasized after Prince Sultan ibn Fahd, president of the Saudi Football Federation, and Prince Nawaf ibn Faisal, SFF deputy president, held a meeting with the national team players, officials and coaching staff.
Seeking to boost the morale of the team on the eve of the big match, Prince Sultan and Prince Nawaf expressed confidence the home team have the resiliency to put the two tuneup defeats against Finland (4-1) and Egypt (1-0) behind them and try and win against the Koreans.
The odds, however, will be stacked against the Saudis who will be battling a Korean side that is building on their semifinal finish in the 2002 World Cup which Japan and South Korea co-hosted.
“We’ve finished analyzing Saudi and feel confident we can achieve the result we want,” Korea’s Dutch coach Jo Bonfrere was quoted as saying yesterday. “We respect Saudi Arabia but we have come here to win and that’s what I expect from the team.” Bonfrere has again put his faith in resurgent striker Lee Dong-gook, who has scored nine goals in 15 games since he took over as coach last June.
Still, the Saudi soccer brass have a lot of faith in the team undergoing a transition with the arrival of new talents. Prince Nawaf said that the two friendly matches against Egypt and Finland do not reflect the real performance of the Saudi team. He added: “We always search for the best of the team. The performance in the two friendly matches was not convincing. After meeting with the coach staff, we sensed the high spirit of the players and we are convinced that we are going to win the match.”
Prince Sultan and Saudi national team coach Argentinean Gabriel Calderon discussed the game plan against South Korea. Prince Sultan reviewed the mistakes which led to the past two losses.
“I met with players and talked to them about the importance of the game especially since we are playing in front of home crowd. They promised me that they would play their best and I am very optimistic that we will achieve a positive result,” said Prince Sultan.
He added: “I urge Saudi fans to come to the stadium and support their team from the first minute to the last minute. They do not need an invitation because I am sure that they will fill the stadium.”
South Korea lead the group with three points from a 2-0 win against Kuwait. Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan are equal with one point after drawing their match 1-1 in Uzbekistan.
Sami Al-Jaber, the team captain, asked Saudi fans, especially the ones in the Eastern Province, to come out in numbers to support of the national team. He said: “We have a duty to win the match and the fans duty is to support us from the stadium. We will show the fans a different team from the one that played the friendly matches.”
Saudi striker Yasser Al-Qahtani said that crowd support is crucial to win the game. He said: “The match against South Korea is the most important match in the group. We need the fans’ support in the match. We promise our fans that we will take the Group A lead after the match against Korea on Friday.”
