Following their unexpected exit from the President’s Cup, Zlatko turns the page to a happier chapter in AGL

Al Ain’s Croatian coach Zlatko Dalić described his team’s elimination in the President Cup quarterfinals as a ‘shock’ following “a tough challenge against Al Nasr”.
“We have to turn the page and concentrate on our next challenges in the Arabian Gulf League which require a lot of concentration; our task will not be easy,” he commented.
He justified keeping the team’s leader Omar Abdurrahman on the bench by saying: “In fact, during the last four training sessions Omar participated for 30 minutes only because of a minor indisposition. He had fever and back pains.”
“It was not easy for him to play so many matches with short intervals during the last six months. Therefore, I didn’t want to engage him in today’s match, but when our team lagged behind, I decided to send him in in the second half,” he added.
Commenting on their loss, Zlatko said: “We definitely lost the match since the first half when we missed four easy chances to score on Al Nasr before they scored their win goal.”
“The four foreign players of Al Ain are playing under pressure so they didn’t show the required performance. We made several chances but we didn’t have the player who could take advantage of them,” he added.
Asked about how much the team needs to be supported with new players during the winter transfers window, especially with his declaration of the pressure on foreign players, he said: “Six months ago, I talked about the team’s need for support. For example, the current team list includes one left back only, and he is Khaled Abdurrahman who has just recovered. We don’t have enough players, sometimes we need to relieve some of them and we should be ready for sudden absences for injuries under the pressure of matches. We do need to support our team with new players.”
Regarding the recent ineffectiveness of Douglas, he said: “I am not seeking change just for change. We are searching for a special type of players. Douglas is under pressure laid by all, and today he had several chances but he didn’t make use of them because of pressure from all and particularly social media.”