ZORAN: WE ARE THINKING ABOUT OUR NEXT MATCH AND WINNING THE LEAGUE SHIELD
STRESSED THAT HIS TEAM DESERVED THE QUALIFYING CARD TO THE LAST 16-TEAMS ROUND
Croatia’s Head Coach of Al Ain FC, Zoran Mamic, congratulated his team on winning the match against Al Rayyan and qualifying to the last 16-teams round of the AFC Champions League. He stressed: “The opponent lost by 1-4 at home and among their fans which means that we did well though they had chances but they did not succeed in translating them into goals, while my team deserved to win and qualify to the next stage.”
“I always play each confrontation with the aim in my mind to win I work hard to prepare the team players properly to achieve the desired targets and snatch the 3 points out of each match and I did mention previously that expectations are difficult in football matches,” he said in response to a question on whether he expected the stunning result.
Commenting on another question on reasons behind substituting El Shahat and Mohannad, he said: “indeed, Mohannad got a yellow card and I was afraid to be sent off by another second card. As for El Shahat, he was hit without ball on several occasions during the confrontation, and so I decided to replace him especially he is one of the important players in the team and we need everyone’s efforts in the coming confrontations.”
On the final confrontation in the last 16-teams round, he said: “I concentrate only on our match against Al Nasr in the Arabian Gulf League. We are looking forward to winning the league title because we have not won any trophy this season.” He concluded: “After that, we will think about the President’s Cup and then we’ll go back to focus on matches of the AFC Champions League.”
