Jamie Day wants same performance against India

After a spirited show against a stronger Afghanistan side, Bangladesh coach Jamie Day wants a repeat of that performance in their next FIFA World Cup 2022 and AFC Asian Cup 2023 qualifiers’ match against India on Monday.

On Thursday, Bangladesh came from a goal down to draw 1-1 against a physically stronger Afghanistan team in their Group E match at the Jassim Bin Hamad Stadium in Doha, Qatar. Defender Topu Barman scored the equaliser six minutes from stipulated time after forward Amredin Sharifi gave the 149th ranked Afghanistan the lead in the 47th minute. ‘It’s a fantastic achievement against a very good team. We are looking forward to take that confidence into the India game,’ said Day through a video message on Friday. ‘It was a very pleasing performance last night. The boys played fantastic 90 minutes, showed great attitude and were great to keep going and got the deserved goal and at least one point. We could have got three [points] as well.’ Earlier in the first-leg, Bangladesh lost to Afghanistan by a solitary goal at the Central Republican Stadium in Dushanbe on September 10, 2019. The stalemate against Afghanistan was Bangladesh’s second draw in the qualifiers with the first one coming against India in Kolkata, when the match also ended in a 1-1 stalemate.

Now Bangladesh will take on India (105), who are ranked 79 spots higher than Bangladesh (184), and Day thinks that his charges will have to be at their best and repeat a performance similar to their showing against Afghanistan if they are to gain some points. ‘We know it’s going to be an extremely tough game again. We are asking the boys’ to repeat that performance and reach their maximum levels, which we know we are going to need to do against India… Hopefully, we can repeat the level,’ Day added. Bangladesh’s scorer Topu also echoed the coach and is hopeful of repeating the same performance against India. ‘We all are motivated, our confidence level is boosted up from our performance in the previous game. We are confident to repeat that level of performance in the next match…Hope, we will be able to leave the ground with a positive result on June 7,’ said Topu. ‘We are now fully concentrating on the next match against India…If we want a direct qualification in [AFC] Asian Cup, getting point from the match against India is very important.’

Bangladesh suffered a blow before their game against India, who conceded a 0-1 loss against Asian Champions Qatar on Thursday night, as a key midfielder Shohel Rana got injured during the match against Afghanistan. Despite the draw, Bangladesh are still at the bottom of the five-team table with two points from six games and will end their qualifiers campaign with the match against Oman on June 15.