League Cup dispels Al Ain fans’ concerns about reserve players

Al Ain team killed several birds with one stone during their match against their guest Kalba, the day before yesterday, in the second leg of the preliminary round of the Professional Football League Cup. In addition to qualifying for the second stage of the competition with a 6-3 aggregate win, the fans were reassured about the substitutes’ bench in light of the absence of nine key players due to their joining the national teams. While the players brought in by Argentine coach Hernan Crespo succeeded in dispelling the anxiety on the substitutes’ bench, this is not final, especially since the biggest challenge they may face is not getting the chance to participate in major competitions, in light of Crespo’s reliance on the closed list policy as happened last season, and not resorting to the player rotation policy.

Al-Zaeem was the third most participating club in the preliminary round of the Professional League Cup, which missed its players in the second leg due to the international break, but it was the most affected due to the loss of nine key players at once after Khaled Issa, Khaled Al-Hashemi, Kwame Otoi, Yahya Nader and Mohammed Abbas joined the national team, and Soufiane Rahimi was called up to the Moroccan national team, Laba Kodjo to the Togo national team, Alejandro Kaku to the Paraguayan national team, Park Young to the South Korean national team, and Youssef Abdo to join the Olympic team.

“The performance of the players despite not participating continuously with the team, which led us to qualify, will help us greatly and make us stronger,” Crespo said in the press conference following the match in which Al Ain turned a 0-1 deficit into a 3-1 win and qualified with a 6-3 aggregate victory.

The Argentine coach added, praising the substitutes: “We had players participating with the team for the first time. The match may have shown that there was something we lacked in the performance, which was the lack of harmony between the squad members. However, in the second half we managed the match better, and the performance was good, and we deserved the victory as a result.”

The team captain, Bandar Al Ahbabi, supported what his coach, Hernan Crespo, said about the match helping the substitute players to perform well, pointing out that the match proved the saying “Al Ain is with those who are present”, despite the strength of their competitor Kalba and their high ambitions, as they entered the match armed with them to obtain the qualification card.

Speaking after the match, he said: “Our performance was excellent in the match which was not easy. We suffered from the absence of 90% of the main players, but despite that, Al Ain were the ones who were present. In my opinion, all matches are difficult and in football there are no easy confrontations. There are lessons that are important to learn from, such as the Al Bataeh match, in which we were ahead by three goals and in the end we came out with a draw.”

short rest

Al Ain players were given a short break, and will resume training this week in preparation for the opening match in the AFC Champions League for the elite, when the leader hosts its guest, Al Sadd of Qatar, next Monday in the tournament, which it enters as the title holder, and has no choice but to win only, if it wants to confirm its readiness to defend its title, especially since the journey will be difficult for it.