Female national team, Super Falcons’ coach, Thomas Dennerby has blamed poor attitude from his players for their shoddy performance against Algeria in Tuesday’s second leg of their 2020 Olympic Games qualifier, and admitted that his side’s 1-0 victory at Agege Stadium, Lagos came mostly through mother luck, megasportsarena.com reports.
The Swedish soccer tactician slammed his players for their poor movements during play, their inability to string accurate passes and blunt efforts at goal, but conceded that it must have been because they did not have enough time to train together before the hosting the Algerians at The Temple of Soccer.
Although the Falcons eventually won 3-0 on aggregate, Dennerby was not satisfied with his team’s form in the second leg, as he went on to posit that his players were overconfident and relaxed, because they won the first leg 2-0 in Algiers, then took their feet off the pedal during the second leg, which they only managed to edge with a late solo goal by Asisat Oshoala.
The coach praised Oshoala for stepping up as captain of the side for the day, but admitted that the team must improve on their finishing for the final match in the race to Tokyo 2020, as he believes they will face stiffer opposition from Cote d’Ivoire in the next round.
Cote d’Ivoire held hosts Mali to a goalless draw to set up a clash with Nigeria, after they won 3-0 at home last week, but the Falcons will be boosted with the memory of how they stopped the same opposition on penalties early this year, to win the regional West African Football Union (WAFU) Cup of Nations at their backyard in Abidjan.
Dennerby submitted: “We need to improve for the next game. We need to play at 100%, not 90%. The defence was okay, but our attacking game was not good enough.
“We made it so much difficult than it should be. It was a weak game for us, our passing was very poor, we were too slow and had many touches on the ball which really affected our game.
“Our passing game was not accurate; movement on the pitch was not good. It was not the kind of performance you expect from this tea.
“The players did not come with a good attitude to the game, maybe because we won the first leg, but hopefully we will do better and give a better attitude next time.
“I am happy that we won the game and we did not concede any goal. The result is not what we wanted but we are happy we have progressed through to the next round.”
