The coach of the Portuguese national football team, Paulo Bento, confirmed that the intense pressure of matches in the “Gulf 26” tournament forces all coaches to change the formation from one match to another, in response to the criticism he was subjected to for not being consistent with a clear formation, and his changes to the positions of the players, What technical observers considered played a role in the loss to Kuwait 1-2 in the second round, in addition to gross defensive errors.
Pinto told Emirates Today: “Defensive mistakes are part of football, and we must deal with them.” Pinto pointed out that “the national team’s position has become difficult in qualifying, and solutions must be found in the last match against Oman, as the team still has a chance to advance.” ».
He explained: “Against Kuwait, we created several chances to score, but we were not successful, and certainly in this case you will not win, even though the team had the ball throughout the match. This is a normal thing that happens in football, and the ball is now in the players’ court, and we must solve this problem.” .
He added: “The early goal in the match should have made the match easier, and we had the ball the whole time, but they took advantage of a mistake and scored a draw. In the second half, we were the better team, and the opposing team relied on counterattacks, but from another mistake, the Kuwaiti team succeeded in scoring the winning goal.” .
Regarding changing a number of players in the starting lineup, he said: “There is no team in the tournament that can maintain the same formation that it starts with in every match. Two or three changes must be made, as there is not enough time for recovery, and the players must be protected.”
Pinto defended the individual mistakes committed by the team that are repeated in every match. He said: “Individual mistakes are part of football. For me, mistakes are not repeated. The situations are different. If you talk about a penalty kick against Uzbekistan, it is different from the situation of the penalty kick in the Qatar match, in addition to “The mistakes against Kuwait are not what happened before. For me, football has mistakes, and they must be dealt with.”
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