Monday, April 9, 2012

The Booth point of view

David Booth is hands-on with his players at half-time
Phnom Penh Crown head coach David Booth gave his view of his side's 4-1 win over Chhlam Samuth immediately after the final whistle on Sunday:
"We've had 6 games in 19 days and we've almost kept the same team, same eleven throughout and I honestly think tiredness came into it today. When you ask them to train every day and play as many games, they've not had a day off in more than three weeks, so some tiredness was excusable today. We scored 4, we could've scored 7 or 8 with a little bit more sharpness. But it's hard to get them to press, to push, to do everything right when leading 3-0. We saw last week with the Police what can happen, so we said at half-time that we had to be tight. The ref made it too comfortable for us early on in the game with the red card. Immediately the players know they're going to get more of the ball. Probably a game best forgotten for talking it up. We deserved it, we worked very hard. We made a lot of mistakes in the games up til now, and we've got a chance to rectify that and get down to some business, with a break of 10 days or so."

"I can't complain really. I felt they were tired so I introduced some pace with the substitutions. The last thing you want is a lot of pace when you are tired and Hong Pheng and Makara have lots of pace. Sok Pheng can put himself about a bit and scored a terrific goal. I thought Emmanuel played well today, his passing was lovely, and I also thought Suhana did well too, he kept the ball for us and I'm pleased he scored. The pitch was not good, it's bouncy but I don't want to blame the pitch. They don't maintain the field very well. All they needed was a little water and a roller, at least to make it flat for the weekend."
Phnom Penh Crown return to C-League action against BBU on Saturday 21 April.
The Crown team get their half-time talk from head coach David Booth
Referee Yien Kivatanak waits for the penny to drop, with the two captains looking on
The Crown starting line-up before the match begins
The match officials check on players socks before the game!
Crown in the dressing room before the game v Chhlam Samuth

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