10 Kittens and a Lion

We all were excited for this match. It was a Do or Die for sure even if it was the first match of the group stage. I admit I was very optimistic about this match, I thought the team would be fueled up and pumped up for this encounter. What more do they want? A stadium which has a capacity of 65,000 was filled up for them. Everyone there for them and a match to prove themselves again, yet all we get as a nation from these so-called professionals is a bad start to the road to Johannesburg.

From the start of the match Bahrain were attacking our open defense, running around in our side of the pitch as if they were on an empty parking lot. Our passing was sure very bad, no pass accuracy at all.

We might ask ourselves what went wrong in the team. The thing is we wouldn't know that. Don't blame the referee like the commentator did in the match. Every tackle got the commentator
blaming the referee for anything that happened.

Our midfield was shattered, Fawzi Basheer who had an attacking role on the midfield was held way back in the midfield line. There was absolutely no way the ball could reach the strikers from the midfield. Any player gets the ball and has absolutely no one to pass it to as all the rest are marked.

Our left side of the defense was like an open road. I remember one strike were the Bahraini striker easily got past in between 3 of our defenders. Good thing it wasn't a goal.

I was disappointed by the performance of all the players except one, that is Ali Al-Habsi for sure. He saved a few definite goals and the goal that was scored was not his fault but the defenders fault. Whenever a corner is played there should be two defenders between the goalkeeper, each defender marking the area of each goal post. But only the left of our goalkeeper was protected and the right side was not.

This is our first defeat in Oman since 4 years now. There was no sense of patriotism in our players today. Only Ali Al-Habsi showed that, the rest were being outplayed and seemed lost in the pitch. If only they had that sense of patriotism they would've done something about the outcome of the match today.

Speaking of Patriotism, if only you guys watched UAE's match against Kuwait today. I watched it right after Oman's match finished. That was football, that was team-work and in that match I found what I call patriotism. All the players in UAE and Kuwait (despite being 2-0 down) were giving it their all. Sadly we don't have that in our football players.

The funny thing was watching our players diving after every tackle they got from the Bahraini players. Also another funny thing is, during the 1st half and a part of the 2nd half the referee was surely on our side.

Bahrain played a good match, even though they were a bit dirty and tried to waste a lot of time. Macala sure knew how to handle the game and Bravo to him for that. He closed all the flanks, locked down Oman's midfield and marked our key players.

I just hope this loss has a good impact on our players rather than put them down. Yes this was our chance but there is no use crying over spilled milk right now. We have to focus on our coming matches and try our best to snatch every point we can get. This is not over yet, Bahrain have a bad record when it comes to home matches, so let's hope for the best.

Congratulations to Bahrain for this win, they sure deserved it.

The 10 kittens are the rest of the players, The lion is Ali Al-Habsi.