Bangladesh are hungry to make it to the semifinals of the SAFF Championship when they take on Bhutan in their last Group B match today at the Sree Kanteerava Stadium in Bengaluru. Bangladesh are coming off a morale-boosting 3-1 victory over Maldives and will be looking to continue their momentum against Bhutan.
After Lebanon and Maldives play in the first match of the day at the same site, the second match of the day will begin at 8:00 p.m. (British Summer Time).
With three points apiece, Bangladesh and Maldives are tied for second place in the four-team group behind Lebanon, which is in first place with six points. Bhutan is in last place with nil points, while Bangladesh and Maldives are tied for second in the group.
Depending on how the match between the Maldives and Lebanon turns out, the squad led by Javier Cabrera may require a win in order to secure a spot in the semifinals of the regional football tournament that is being held after a gap of 14 years.
In their previous six matches against each other in the SAFF Championship, Bangladesh has never suffered a defeat at the hands of the Himalayan country. In fact, the only time the two teams tied was in the 2008 competition. However, they did suffer a defeat at the hands of Bhutan at the Asian Cup pre-qualifiers in 2016. This defeat effectively banished them from participating in international football for a period of one year and eighteen months.
Because we have a fantastic chance to go to the semifinals, I know that all of us here are famished for a win. And of course, the chance is in our hands, and we don’t want to lose it,” the captain, Jamal Bhuiyan, said before the last practice session at KSFA Stadium yesterday. “We don’t want to waste it.”
“We are confident about getting three points but not over-confident, which may cause problems because we lost against Lebanon by playing with over-confidence,” the 33-year-old player stated. “We are not overconfident because we lost against Lebanon by playing with over-confidence.”
In spite of Bhutan’s defeats at the hands of Maldives and Lebanon, their performances in both contests were remarkable and full of passionate competition.
The Bhutanese team’s coach, Pema Dorji, is holding out hope that Bhutan may still make it into the semifinals of the competition with a victory against Bangladesh and a loss for Maldives against Lebanon. This would result in all three teams finishing with the same number of points.
We have not yet finished our portion of the competition. In the third and final match, we aim to win all three points. Pema made his announcement late on Monday night. “That will be our determination and our focus,” he stated.