The Hindu : Sport / Football : We need to play well all through: Houghton

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Thursday, Oct 12, 2006
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We need to play well all through: Houghton

Principal Correspondent

Bangalore: The need to maintain intensity and effort all through the 90 minutes of play was again reiterated by Indian football coach Bob Houghton when he addressed the press, shortly after India's 0-3 loss to Japan in the Asian Cup qualifying match at the Sree Kanteerava Stadium here on Wednesday.

"We played well in the second half and this young man (pointing to Baichung Bhutia) sitting beside me here, worked really hard and kept the spirits up. But we need to play well all through the 90 minutes. After conceding the opening goal, there seemed to be a bit of trepidation among our players. That shouldn't be there," Houghton said.

All praise for Japan

The Indian coach praised the Japanese team. "You saw their (Japan's) standard, that's what we too have to achieve as a team. I thought we failed to counter their wing-backs and because of that, we were falling inside rather than go upfront. We also had a problem in the initial minutes, losing an injured Deepak Mondal. It did affect our plans. But I am happy with the way our boys came back in the second half and you got to admit that there wasn't much we could do about their third goal (by Kengo Nakamura), that was outstanding, wasn't it?," Houghton asked. The coach declared that it was imperative for the team to play consistently all through the game in their next outing against Yemen. "It will be a tough match," reminded Houghton.

Meanwhile Japan's coach Ivica Osim stressed that his team could have played better in the second-half. "I am not satisfied with our game in the second half. The pitch was not in good condition and it did not help our short passes, may be long passes would have been fine and may be we would have made fewer mistakes. As for the Indians, they have two good forwards, especially their captain. They were agile but they never got the support," Osim said.

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