JEDDAH, 10 July 2007 — New-look Saudi Arabia come under scrutiny tomorrow when they meet South Korea in a Group D match in the AFC Asian Cup football tournament at Jaka Baring Stadium in Palembang, Indonesia. Gametime is 3:35 p.m. local time. The expectations from fans are disparate with one section in agreement the team are doom to fail under the new coach while others are optimistic he will deliver a surprise this year.
National team coach Brazilian Hélio dos Anjos has so far proven the doubters wrong having won all but one of the four friendly matches in Singapore. The 1-1 draw with North Korea last week was the only blot in the Kingdom’s otherwise immaculate record.
But the fans are still far from satisfied specially after the coach announced on Friday the lineup of the 23 players for the tournament as follows: Assaf Al-Garni (Al-Wahda), Waleed Abdullah (Al-Shabab), Yasser Al-Mosailem (Al Ahli), Ahmed Al-Bahri (Al Nasr), Ibrahim Hazzazi (Al-Ahli), Kamil Al-Mousa (Al-Wahda), Majed Al-Amri (Al-Ittifaq), Osama Hawsawi (Al Wahda), Redha Tukar (Al-Ittihad), Walid Abdrabh Jahdali (Al-Ahli); Abdoh Autef (Al-Shabab), Abdulrahman Al-Qahtani (Al-Ittifaq), Ahmed Al-Mousa (Al-Wahda), Ahmed Darwesh (Al-Ahli), Khaled Aziz (Al-Hilal), Omar Al-Ghamdi (Al-Hilal), Saud Khariri (Al-Ittihad), Taisir Al-Jassam (Al-Ahli), Talal Al-Khaibrai (Al-Wahda), Malek Maaz (Al-Ahli), Nassir Al-Shamrani (Al-Wahda), Saad Al-Harthi (Al-Nasr), and team captain Yasser Al-Qahtani (Al-Hilal). The exclusion of Hamad Al-Muntashiri of Ittihad club, the 2005 Asian Football Player of the Year, riled the fans to boiling point in what they perceived as a flawed decision on the part of the Brazilian mentor.
“This is not an event to underestimate. Major national teams who played in the event already such as Australia and Japan seemed tough enough to win. They all have the pro mentality and experience and their teams include young and experienced players, and this is what we were hoping to see in our team but did not,” said Ahmed Abdulsalam, a 60-year-old football fan.
Maybe he has a point for not including Mohammed Nur and excluding Al-Muntashiri, said another 35-year-old fan Salim Al-Harbi. “We cannot judge the coach without giving him a first chance and then start commenting after the team’s first game though these players have proved by far how outstanding they could be either in the field or to replace their peers in case of injury, not to mention Al-Muntashiri being the only Saudi defender who can play with both feet.”
Having all these young players on the field without help from the veterans might cause a big embarrassment if they were beaten by so many goals, chorused 22- year-olds Salih Mahmoud and Khalid Saeed.
We cannot blame the players if such a failure occurred they added. The players for sure try their best but some technicalities would hinder their goal such as not seeing all of these players playing together until this month and may appear total strangers not understanding each other’s way of playing in a game.
Despite the criticisms, Prince Nawaf ibn Faisal, head of the Saudi delegation in the tournament and deputy-president of Saudi Youth Welfare and Saudi Football Federation, supports Anjos. He arrived on Sunday in Jakarta and attended the team’s training.
The prince said in his statement to the SPA the coach had been changing his plans during the previous training camp whether in Turkey or in Singapore to give chances to all the players to perform their best. It is also, he added, to ensure he settles with the best suitable ones. There is no way that the coach would know he can make good use of a player and excludes him, he said.
