Ord happy with Qatar camp, but strikers?
The Bangladesh national football team is currently undergoing a long-term training camp. They have just returned from a two-week camp in Qatar, which was one of the three phases of this training, and will be off to Thailand on Tuesday before they head to Laos to play a FIFA friendly against the hosts.
The two-week camp in Qatar was a tactical one following a two-week fitness camp at home. Now after two matches against Thai clubs next week, Bangladesh will play against Laos on March 27.
Head coach Andrew Ord feels that the two phases of the camp have so far benefitted his side and prepared them for Laos, who have had continuous game time in the meanwhile.
“It was critical as they would have had nothing to motivate them otherwise,” Ord said in an e-mail interview with The Daily Star recently. “The Laos league has been going for four games so their national players have played 90 minutes each week. This is a big advantage but by having an intense training camp and pushing the players as hard as possible we aim to be ready to be competitive physically,” Ord added.
Like he said before their departure for Qatar, the Australian coach has already done some chopping and changing to the 24-man squad that went to Qatar, excluding four young players while adding eight Abahani, players, who were not previously part of the camp due to their AFC Cup engagements. He is expected to trim the squad to 23 members before flying to Thailand.
“Eight players [from Abahani] will join us for two days' training in Dhaka before we will decide who travels after assessing them,” Ord said.
The coach watched footage of Abahani's game against Bengaluru FC last week, and was satisfied with the performance.
“There were a few things I was pleased about with the Abahani game. The players did not make any silly mistakes that gave a goal away and that is something that is going to be really important for us. Also they tried to defend as a team and made it difficult for Bengaluru,” the coach opined.
However, as always, scoring goals remains a concern for the coaching staff. The local strikers, like in domestic competitions, fail to find their feet when playing international matches, either for the clubs or country. So the coach will be focusing more on defending his own goal than going for goals from the start.
“The big test will be in the final third as most of the attackers are either substitutes for their clubs or play in totally different positions due to coaches playing foreigners as strikers. If we can become more dangerous in attack and stop the mistakes at the back then we will have a good chance,” Ord added.
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