"We will enter the stadium for a win and we have high chances of making through to next stage," said skipper Sagar Thapa on Wednesday at the pre-match press conference.[break]
Every member of the squad is well aware of the fact that a win against Afghans will strengthen our hopes of advancing into the next stage. Nepal´s British coach Graham Roberts too is well aware of the situation and is confident that his team can beat the Afghans. "The match is vital for us and a win will boost our chance of making to the final stage," Roberts said.
Underestimating the Afghans, however, can cost the hosts dearly and the coach Roberts is in no mood to take them lightly.
"Afghanistan are strong side and they are dangerous on set-pieces and have good strikers. They have a couple of weaknesses though and we will penetrate through those weaknesses," Roberts said.
Looking at past records, Nepal has always had an upper hand against the South Asian rivals, but making a judgment on the basis of old records shall be unfair as the last time the two teams met was during the 2009 SAFF Championship. There has been a lot of changes in the both squads since then.
Four players of the Afghanistan squad play from German clubs and one from America. The taller and stronger visiting side will also have physical advantage over the home-side while the latter will have home ground and home crowd advantage.
So far Nepal has played two official international matches against Afghanistan and on both occasions Nepal recorded convincing victories. The first time they met was during the 13th Asian Games qualifiers held in Kathmandu in 2003 in which Nepal had beaten them 4-0. Similarly, in their last encounter, Nepal had defeated the Afghani team 3-0 in 2009.
"We will try our best to prove that we are a good team," said Afghani captain Israfeel Kohistani. The Afghani coach Yosuf Kargar is also confident that his side will put up a good show and throw a tough challenge to the home team. "We have young players and we are ready for the tournament," Kargar said but lamented the fact that his team lacked experience. "We lack experience in the international tournaments as we started to participate in the international tournaments lately."
Afghanistan squad consists of some talented young players. Keeping striker Sediq Walizada down would be a difficult task for the Nepali defending line up. Walizada was the player to complete a hat-trick in their 3-0 victory over Bhutan in their first leg playoff to secure a place in the group D qualifiers.
Probable Nepali line-up
Goalkeeper: Kiran Chemjong
Defenders: Sagar Thapa (C), Rohit Chand, Sandeep Rai
Midfielders: Rabin Shrestha, Biraj Maharjan, Bharat Khawas, Raju Tamang, Nirajan Khadka,
Forwards: Anil Gurung, Jumanu Rai.
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