Will it be the last? [Archives:2004/779/Community]

By Adel Al-Khawlani
Yemen Times Staff
The current situation of football in Yemen, as demonstrated by the national coaching staff of the Youth team and the general regression lead us to the sad conclusion that we have “nothing to look backward to with pride, and nothing to look forward to with hope”.
Why did the Coach, Amin Al-Sunaini, not respond to the advice of the wise president when he stated that an experienced foreign Coach is required to lead the hope team along with him? Amin, throughout his coaching post, has never produced for us a positive change in the second half of any encounter, to change the course of events. Utilizing the mistakes of a former games is also totally absent.
The Iraqi Coach maintained his team's clean sheet in the three encounters of the first round, and is expected to surprise football lovers in coming meetings. The Korean Coach, after a 3-0 loss to Iraq, grasped a lesson to defeat Yemen 4-0 in the second meeting of group four qualifiers in the Asian finals. Our Coach benefited from the opening game against Thailand, in which he received a 2-1 defeat, to further lose 4-0 to the Koreans.
Feigning ability while really being unable yields nothing but failure.
It is normal for our champions to come back home from Malaysia with Hunain's pair of boots, with no points but conceding eight goals is the only harvest of three games.
The recent results forced the esteemed Coach of the youth team to bravely declare his resignation after the heavy battle with Korea, however we are convinced that not he alone is responsible for such miserable results, but the players are in the same box. The results should not be surprising: anything is likely to happen to a team in the shadow of haphazard planning and no confidence against spirited opponents accustomed to victory.
The terrible defeats must not be the end of a beginning, as it is hopefully the last one in the history of the Yemeni football if reforms are reconsidered.
What is much more harmful is the spiritual defeat. Why is a considerate Coach obliged to give in so easily after a few defeats?
For us Yemenis, we have been accustomed to tasting the bittersweet losses in many international football competitions for a long time, as that of the 16th Gulf Championship and several eliminations from World Cups. So, why has our Coach not faced the recent calamities with fortitude? Is it not a shame for the commander to quit and leave the warriors suffocating in the embattled area?
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