KARACHI, March 3: Can the 173rd-ranked Pakistan be able beat the 178th-ranked Palestine ever in a football match? That will be the question on everyone’s mind including Pakistan coach Tariq Lutfi’s mind when the fourth football match between the two countries is staged at the Peoples Sports Complex here on Friday afternoon.In the pre-match media briefing at the same venue, the chief coach of the national football team tried to explain why a better-ranked team was constantly losing to the Palestinians.
“They (Palestine) may be a little behind us in world rankings but they get quite a bit of exposure in the Arab world,” said Lutfi, the most-qualified and experienced coach in the country. “They are also more technically sound as they have a fine system in place,” he justified.
“As for our boys, I have been given the assignment as the national team coach some 45 days ago and I’ve been working on putting together a young U-21 team since then. In doing so I’ve noticed that our boys take some 20 minutes to settle in their game and if they concede a goal or two during that time, they lose all their confidence,” Lutfi pointed out, “Still, I am working on building up their confidence and mental strength that a team needs to bounce back in such conditions,” he said.
Pakistan first faced Palestine in Doha on April 2, 2000, when they went down 0-2 to the team. Next, they lost 0-3 at Manama on Feb 18, 2006 and in Lahore on March 1 the result was 1-2. “So we are getting better,” said Lutfi trying to sound optimistic.
Meanwhile, Head of Palestine Delegation Mohammed Abu Srour said that he was very happy to be in Pakistan. “We had a good outing against the Pakistan team in Lahore on March 1 and we are looking forward to our next encounter on Friday,” he announced.
Backing Lutfi on the exposure issue, he said that that their team was lucky to be getting many games against teams such as those of Sudan, Tanzania, Afghanistan and now Pakistan, too.
Palestine Coach Moussa Bezaz also pointed out that this was their senior side as their junior team was busy preparing for their own qualifiers, the first leg of which they lost to Thailand. “But we believe we still have a good chance to qualify there,” he said.
About what he thought about the Pakistan team, he said: “Pakistan definitely have a future in football but need to work hard for it.”
Asked why Pakistan didn’t field their senior team against Palestine so that they could further improve their rankings, Pakistan Football Federation (PFF) Secretary Col Ahmed Yar Khan Lodhi replied that they wanted to give as much practice as they could to the junior side as this is the team that plays the Olympic and World Cup qualifiers.
“After all this is the team that is going to be our senior team soon so we decided to concentrate more on them rather than work on improving our rankings, which is more of a superficial thing anyway,” he explained. To a question about Pakistan’s own system, Col Lodhi said that they only got a proper system some six years back. “The AFC Aid-27 system of coaching young players and building U-14 or younger teams is a good system, which will take football in Pakistan to new heights,” he said.
About how this tour of Pakistan came about for Palestine, Lodhi said that all credit for it goes to the federation President Makhdoom Syed Faisal Saleh Hayat. “He took the initiative and convinced our Palestinian brothers to plan a bilateral series with Pakistan. With this series, the PFF is glad to have brought international events back to the country. Pakistan will tour Palestine to play two Tests there on May 24 and May 27,” he informed.
The match kicks off at 4.00pm.
Squads:PAKISTAN:
Goalkeepers: Mohammad Omar, Amir Gul.Defenders: Manzoor Ahmed, Alamgir Khan, Ahsanullah, Obaid Majeed, Ansar Abbas, Ghazanfar Abbas.Midfielders: Faisal Iqbal, Syed Arif Hussain, Mohammad Tauseef, Mohammad Adil, Mahmood Khan.Strikers: Saddam Hussain, Jadeed Khan Pathan (captain), Rizwan Asif, Kalimullah, Ahmed Akbar Khan, Muhammad Qais.
PALESTINE:Goalkeepers: Mohammed Shbair, Abdallah Alsidawi (captain), Saed Abu Sleem.
Defenders: Ahmed Harbi Mahajna, Mohammad Al-Masri, Khaled Mahdi, Samer Hijazi, Husam Abu Saleh.
Midfielders: Ayman Alhendi, Houssam Wadi, Murad Said, Suleiman Obeid, Hesham Salhe, Khader Yousef, Ashraf Alfawaghra, Atef Abu Bilal, Ismail Amour.
Strikers: Mohammad Jebreen, Mohammad Shatrit, Eyad Abugharqud, Jamal Allan.