Alireza Mansourian: A Tough Game
Mansourian, Head Coach of Iran’s Esteghlal Tehran, , admitted that the match against Al Ain Team at home and among their fans and above all to snatch the qualifying card to the quarter-finals will be a difficult mission for his team. He declared that he commanded his players to have full focus throughout the whole game and not to give Al Ain players the chance to control the game or find their way to his team’s net to avoid complicating the situation for his team to qualify.
In the pre-match press conference, he stated that, “We are confident that the game will not be an easy one. We must have full focus and do our best to qualify. As a matter of fact, 50% of the difficulty of the game can be attributed to the ground factor and the other 50% is the strong team we are facing and their experience in this competition.”
On his comment on the first leg match held in Iran and winning Al Ain team by 0-1, he said, “We controlled the game and played in harmony, but we suffered due to inability to make use of the chances we had.”
He pointed out that, “The penalty kick we got in the recent match was a gift for the team because the game was on its way to a draw result and each team was looking for scoring a goal.”
He added, “Al Ain team exerted lots of pressure on our team. The team has quality players and on top is the midfielder Omar Abdel Rahman; he is an influential player in Al Ain team. I have to say that regardless of the result of the match, Al Ain and Al Ahli of Dubai are the best teams in the AFC Champions League.”
Mansourian denied that his players will be negatively affected by the huge number of supporters expected to be available in Hazza Bin Zayed Stadium. He emphasized that, “We will not panic because of the fans of Al Ain Team. We know that mass crowds will be there supporting their team, but my players will not be affected by that. All what we are going to do is to focus on the match only and try our best to qualify.”
He expressed his hope that the referees of the match would be in full concentration during the whole minutes of the match just to avoid committing mistakes. He stated that, “I have full respect for the referees. They might commit mistakes as they are humans and not computers. In general, I hope they will be fully focused and attentive.”
