Al Duhail Head Coach Christophe Galtier stressed that the team will work on addressing mistakes and entering Al Shamal match in the required performance. In his speech at the pre-match press conference held at 08:30 pm yesterday evening in the club’s press conference hall, the coach said: It is good to focus on our next competitor, but before that we must focus on ourselves first and foremost, and on our performance on the field, especially avoiding the mistakes that cost us dearly in this difficult situation that we are going through, whether for me or for the players or the fans. We must stay fully focused to change the situation. When I watch the content of our matches, I find that we had lots of positive aspects, however we did not make a difference and invest the opportunities that we had during the match. On the other hand, we made mistakes at sensitive times that cost us a lot. That is why I said earlier that we must focus on our performance and not focus on the opponent in order to avoid mistakes.
Galtier added: The recent loss to Al Wakrah was painful for us, especially since the team managed to present a good performance in the first half of the match and was the most widespread on the field.
Galtier continued: I spoke with the players after the recent loss that there are important things we do on the field and there are individual mistakes that are repeated in the matches. We must be realistic on the field and fully focused. In the statistics, we noticed that the players are making a great effort, whether in training or matches. Sometimes the lack of focus and individual mistakes ruin all the effort we put on the field. For years, the team has not experienced what is happening now. Even for me, I have not been through the same situation. We lack a little bit of luck to score goals and avoid individual mistakes that cost us goals, such as the last match in which we conceded a goal from a corner kick. This of course affects us. The question that arises is what will we do in these circumstances? The answer is that we must have a reaction on a personal level, which will have its impact on the general level, and we must simply address the mistakes. Each player on the field has a specific role to play during the match. In modern football, the goalkeeper must have skills in his feet to help the team in addition to his skills in stopping shots on goal. The defenders must defend well before we ask them to attack. The midfielders must recover the balls and then coordinate between the defense and the attack. The attackers must take advantage of the opportunities that come their way. These are the roles that the players must play.
Galtier stated: We were not suffering from absences or injuries. Since January, the team has been complete, but there is only the absence of player Muntari. There is also Edmilson who has not participated since the start of the season. I do not take injuries and absences as an excuse. The available players are doing what is required of them.
He continued: Al Moez will not participate in the match due to an accumulation of yellow cards and he is suffering from some pain, but there will not be many changes in the lineup. We will see during the last training session what will happen in order to prepare the lineup that we will play with.
The coach concluded: The players are used to the month of Ramadan and we, as a technical staff, have to adapt to this month. We have no problem. We have time during the day to prepare for our work and things are going well.
