It was a great sigh for Bangladesh national football team when Papon Singh scored the late winner during the injury period in the second FFIA friendly match as they survived a scare of suffering two-match series defeat.
But Bangladesh booters will have face more though times in next year when they will start their International fixure with Asian Cup qualifying round matches in march. So forwards will have to be more competent, as they will have no plenty of opportunities in the matches in the Asian Cup qualifiers. After the shocking solitary goal defeat in the first match, the hopes of men in Red and Green was destroyed to get a favourable Pot in next year’s Asian Cup Qualifiers draw and the second match turned to salvage the prestige when Maldives got their revenge with a stunning 1-0 win in the reverse fixture of last year’s defeat.
The first defeat and the struggle of the forwards also looked at a bleak end for Bangaldesh team to the calendar year with six defeats in seven matches prior to wining struck from Papon Singh.
In fact Bangladesh just struggled due to disappointing performances of the forwards, in two matches against Maldives, they missed more than half a dozen scoring opportunities.
However, to win the second match was also an important encounter because before Wenesday’s match Bangladesh did never suffer any defeat against Maldives since their fist meeting in 1985 when they won by 8-0 in the SA Games.
However, the Maldives made it challenging the second match for Bangladesh when the visiotrs took the lead at the midway of the first half (23rd minute) though the hosts levelled the margin at the late hour of first half (43rd minute) of the opening 45 minutes session.
But the hosts had to struggle much to win the match when the forwards were giving missing trial for time and again with Rakib Hossain, Fahim, Morsalin, Pervej Emon and debutant Piash Ahmed Nova could not mark their targets have some clear chances.
Interstingly, in the first match when Bangaldsh suffere defeat, Bangladesh despite enjoying the better possessions throughout the 90 minutes game and even opening plenty of scoring chances from series of attacks, could not win the match rather than to suffer defeat.
The poor scoring ability of the forwards are more than alarming for the national side for their coming international assignment in 2025, when they will play Asian Cup 2027, Qualifiers in March.
The head coach Havier Kebrera, in the post-match press conference after winning the second match said that besides the first match against Maldives, Bangladesh should win two more international matches in this year – “I believe we deserved to win the first game also, I feel the boys should have won two more matches this year.
