Al Arabi eye full points against Umm Salal

Doha: Al Arabi will be keen to get back to winning ways in their bid to be back among the elite top four when they take on Umm Salal in Round 14 of the QNB Stars League at the Al Arabi Stadium today at 6.45pm.

Al Arabi are going into the match with back-to-back defeats, 1-6 against Al Sadd and 1-3 against Al Duhail last week and are fifth in the standings with 18 points - five victories, as many defeats and three draws.

Al Arabi coach Heimir Hallgrimsson said his team will be gunning for full points against Umm Salall.

“We are ready to face Umm Salal and our target for this match is three points. We are continuing the work that we started since the beginning of the season through strong preparations. We have a difficult game against an opponent that did not start well, but they have improved now and beat Al Khor in the last round.

 Umm Salal, facing relegation threat along with Al Khor and Al Shahania, are on a high following their 1-0 victory over Al Khor in Week 13 and will look to build on it as it will help them get off the basement, where they now lie with eight points- two wins, as many draws and nine defeats.

The Orange Fortress and Al Shahania have same number of points, but the latter are placed above by virtue of better goal difference.

The former Iceland coach stressed on the need to get maximum points from the match.

“We must win full points because this will have a significant impact on the team’s final ranking. We will try to achieve this target. In the last game against Al Duhail, we deserved at least a draw.” Hallgrimsson said he has been trying to instill the winning mentality.

“The winning mentality was not present for several years, especially when we played against some teams. There was a kind of panic. 

"It takes time to change this mentality of players and develop a winning mentality. It will not happen overnight. I started working in that direction ever since I took charge of Al Arabi. I am happy that everyone supports us in order to create a team that will compete for titles in the future,” he said.

“I may not be with Al Arabi always, but I will be happy that I started this process. I follow the club’s age-group players to choose them for the first team. At least their presence in training is important,” he added.

“Defeats affect the coach of course, but after any defeat we must start preparing for the next match. We must be realistic that we are having a strong project for the future. We hope to succeed in the upcoming match against Umm Salal,” said Hallgrimsson.

Meanwhile, Umm Salal coach Aziz Ben Askar said he has stressed on the importance of remaining focussed in the upcoming matches.

“It will be a difficult match because Al Arabi are a big team with huge fan following in Qatar and they are playing on their home turf.” 

“In the last round, we started a new chapter and we have new players with high spirits. I asked them to focus, play and think professionally as they did in the last match against Al Khor. That is the key to get back to winning path. If we want to keep winning, we must keep our focus,” Askar said. “All team, players and technical as well as administrative staff, are working hard. The players know their task well and they must forget the past in order to restore balance and get positive results for Umm Salal.

“We need to know the importance of every ball and every attack, for us or for the opponent. We have to think that we have an opportunity to stay in the first division and must fight to achieve this difficult target because football is very difficult.

“I am not very satisfied, despite the fact that we won last week after a lot of struggles. That was the first step, we have many other steps and we have 24 players. All players should think the same way and must keep their concentration,” said Askar.

Al Arabi had beaten Umm Salal 5-1 in the first leg of 2019-20 QNB Stars League.