Young Lions aiming to pounce on weary Warriors

Mohd Sham
info@sleague.com

His charges have more than held their own against their more established opponents, judging from their past three stalemates against the Super Reds, DPMM FC and Woodlands Wellington.

But Young Lions honcho Terry Pathmanathan is steadfastly refusing to press the “inexperienced” button when his side welcome the visit of champions SAFFC at Jalan Besar Stadium on Saturday evening.

In fact, the former Singapore defensive stalwart is not entertaining the prospect of humming to the tune of his side’s youthful exuberance and lack of top class football as an outlook for their results during this season.

Pathmanathan explained, “We have to meet a certain level of standard in this league and I always believe that as young boys, my players have to learn.”

“We can’t use the excuse of being young and inexperienced as a reason for our results this season and we have to be self-critical of ourselves always.”

“The team has been built around self-confidence, plenty of hard work, discipline and determination and we always have to take our opposition seriously.”

This very creed that Pathmanathan has instilled into his players will be personified against their weekend encounter with an SAFFC outfit who are licking their wounds after a rather unflattering 4-1 defeat to Chinese outfit Shanghai Shenhua in their maiden AFC Champions League (ACL) encounter.

“SAFFC have shown great quality in their individual play, are vastly experienced and have everything a champion team is required to possess”, he explained.

“But having said that, I will not believe that they cannot be beaten and it’s the 90 minutes that counts and what we do on the pitch.”

“This will be another tough game for us but one thing for sure is that we will be very positive with our approach.”

The Young Lions coach does not share the view that the Warriors are there for the taking, especially after their morale-sapping defeat in Asia’s premier cup competition.

He said, “I think it works both ways; after going losing, they can always rebound and fight back and in their first three league games, they have done well.”

“I don’t think they will allow this setback to distract their league form as they knew it was always going to be a tougher and higher quality competition (the ACL).

“SAFFC have always maintained a good team when the chips are down.”

Pathmanathan also drew encouragement from his team’s gutsy draws, none more so from their encounter against Brunei’s DPMM FC who needed an injury time strike to prevent the Young Lions from recording a major scalp.

He added, “We learnt a good lesson against DPMM and most of our players have been a little too naïve, but they boys are learning and they have to learn fast.”

“Our offensive play needs to be worked on and there is no shortcut to getting the goals that matter and how we go about doing it.”

His counterpart, Warriors chief Richard Bok, will be hoping his side can shrug off their ACL blues following their midweek loss and bounce back against the Young Lions.

With the Choa Chu Kang-based outfit having disposed of championship rivals Home United in their last league combat, SAFFC will be aiming to build on their domestic momentum ahead of their Jalan Besar assignment, with last season’s 0-2 triumph in the corresponding clash being the perfect springboard for the league leaders to once again collect all three points.

They will however have to contend with the suspension of Ahmad Latiff Khamarudin, who was shown the straight red against Home. In addition, Bok may have to consider his defensive options in light of the ACL red card shown to Hafiz Osman, who will be forced to sit out for their next continental encounter.