KUALA TERENGGANU, June 17 — National team Head Coach Kim Pan Gon has warned his players to cut out technical mistakes when facing Papua New Guinea in a Tier One international friendly at the Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin Stadium, Kuala Nerus, on Tuesday (June 20).
After conducting a full evaluation, he found that individual errors and poor decision-making were among the factors that affected the performance of the Harimau Malaya against the Solomon Islands on Wednesday (June 14).
From the tactical aspects, the South Korean said he is very satisfied after the team managed to dominate the entire match.
“I think if we want to play a high quality (game) we need to reduce these kinds of small technical problems such as individual mistakes and decision-making problems, so we must improve this.
“But in terms of tactical, I am very satisfied, we were confident and dominated the game. We saw the statistics, there was zero shooting on our goal, they (Solomon Islands) totally never had a proper build-up, they cannot play, this is what we are looking for,” Kim said when met.
Last Wednesday, Harimau Malaya came from behind to beat the world number 134 Solomon Islands 4 – 1 in a Tier One international friendly at the Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin Stadium, thus marking Malaysia’s third consecutive victory in international friendlies since last March.
Commenting further, he said Malaysian – Finnish midfielder Nooa Laine, who arrived here on Tuesday (June 13), has the potential to be in the squad this coming Tuesday, in addition to another defender to fill the void left by injured Natxo Insa and Muhamad Feroz Baharudin.
“We still have a few players to be carefully monitored, let us see in the coming days. If they are not available we will protect them but still, we are keen to prepare well against Papua New Guinea,” Kim said.
Based on the world rankings, Malaysia is ranked 138th while Papua New Guinea is 159th.
— Bernama
