Two foreign coaches to train Lanka’s Footballers next year
View(s):The Football Federation of Sri Lanka has planned to hire two coaches from European countries to prepare the national team ahead of next year’s South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) Championships. The SAFF Championships will be held in Dhaka, Bangladesh from September 4 to 15, next year.
One of them will be a specialist on fitness. This is the first time that a fitness coach is being brought to Sri Lanka.
They are expected to arrive in Sri Lanka by February 2018.
Sri Lanka has won a SAFF championships only in 1995 in Colombo but the performance had dipped to lowest ebb ever since.
At the last competition held in 2015 in India, Sri Lanka lost to Afghanistan 0-5 in the semi-finals. Sri Lanka has slipped back in international competitions. But the FFSL hope to make a significant difference in the coming year.
“The fitness of Sri Lanka football players is not up to the mark and they are unable to keep up the fitness level to the required 90 minutes. It is during the dying minutes that the goals are scored against us. Due to this we are hoping to lay special emphasis to fitness this time,” said Jaswar Umar, Secretary General FFSL. Other than that priority is to be given to domestic football.
In mid January 2018, the South Asian pool will be selected. And from the start from February next year training will continue in earnest.
The FFSL is also planning to get foreign teams in order to offer match practices for the local team. The teams which are to be invited have not been decided as yet.
The formation of the South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) pool had been delayed due the fact that the Dialog Champions League is currently in progress. This tournament is expected to end before December 20, this year.