We played a good first half. Damn nearly got an heart attack when Ahmad Ibrahim saved our ass. Now please sub Mhawi out. He is prone to make a crucial mistake..
Are you serious ? Give me a time where we stringed a few passes together ? As soon as they get the ball it's just a long ball to no one ! .
No midfield again. What is the thought process behind playing a 4-4-2 and having no creative midfielder? this will either end in a draw or 1-0 loss for us.
He's trying the Liecester City tactics seriously there is no midfield the tactics is to give to a CB who then shoots it as far as they can up field
the difference between Iraq and ksa is that the saudis have an actual coach and not a guardiola wannabe
Saudi Arabia 1-0 Iraq Thats it with these horrible qualifiers. We were playing terrible, didn't deserve to win at all. Let's first learn how to string a few passes together before thinking about qualifying for World Cups.
Saudis should thank Radhi, he just sent them to the World Cup. Is it too much to ask to have a team that isn't an embarrassment? I'm not even asking for them to qualify for the world cup, Im just sick of this constant embarassents. Both times now those saudi bastards insult us and our country and in return we gave them 6 points. We should be better than this. Even with the corruption, there is no reason why we should lose to such a weak team. There is nothing special about this saudi team, or the australians or UAE and even Japan is very beatable. I have nothing but disgust for Radhi, Abdul khaliq masood, Kamil zughayr, Walid tabra and everyone else involved in this disgrace.
Every team in any of these groups is beatable. But that's not enough. Unfortunately Iraq plays the same game every damn game. The run in Asia Cup 2015 was more flattering then most realize. I don't think your coach is a bad guy, but there is very little cohesion in your team and the players are often angry with one another. Its very frustrating to watch, because I am pretty sure me and most fans of football in Asia today were cheering for Iraq. The other thing - stop using these overaged players. Focus on your real youth and just that alone will give you great results.
It's more than just the coach Lambo. A coach can't change the quality of the player. Just look at the way we play. It has been the same under every coach. Our problems are deeper.. Nothing will change under another coach. We have to set up a strong league and develop players properly instead of changing coaches every year.
All of this is down to the coach. No cohesion, no tactics when attacking, no useful substitutions, no organisation in the defense, mindless call ups, strange line ups. All game long, you can hear him screaming at the players to run back and defend. He has no idea what he's doing and a competent coach would make a huge difference.
Look at the saudis. They have nobody special but they are top of the group. It's their coach who gets the credit. A good coach makes average players better than they are. It's not just corruption or facilities or the league. Every country in the world has corruption. Argentina's FA is arguably worse than ours. Brazil's national team is selected by sponsors not the coach in addition to the rampant corruption and terrible infrastructure, African countries have an even worse league than us, worse funding and deeper corruption yet countries like Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Senegal, Cameroon, etc.. consistently produce top players. The difference is that those places have the knowledge of how to produce players and use them. They have coaches and the countries that don't have good coaches find some from other countries. Not a single Iraqi coach deserves to coach our national team. Look at our players and the saudi players. Which of the saudis is good enough to play in Serie A? Or even Turkey? Which of them can play for a title contending Swedish club? All their players are in their weak Saudi League. Amjad Radhi scored goal after goal there, Marwan as well. Saad is possibly the best DM there. We should be better than them. It inexcusable to lose like this twice. This time we can't even argue about the referee. Every attack we had it was clear that there was no cohesion between the players. They don't know when to pass, or what kind of run to make. Saudi players were the opposite. That's how they score all of their goals. What does it mean when the team has had training camp after training camp, so many games and still no cohesiveness? When do we look at the coach and say maybe he's the problem? Zico had much worse players but there was at least a gameplan you can see on the pitch. What kind of coach goes with a 4-4-2 with players like Saad and Attwan in the middle? It was so predictable that we'd lose the midfield. He has Rebin Asaad, Osama Rashid, Brwa Nouri all available but he doesn't even give them a chance. This is not our level, and it's not unreasonable to expect more. Radhi is nothing but a puppet for the FA. That's why they hired him, and that's why they refuse to fire him or get a foreign coach.
Spot on mate completey agree with everything you have said . I have not seen a single good thing from Radhi , we are just lucky that other teams we are playing are shit too but not as shit as us that's why we aren't getting humiliated. Can't believe people posting 'good first half ' on here like wtf did you see ? I was cringing everytime we had the ball where we couldn't string 2 decent passes together. Radhi should get the sack for not calling up one of Osama/Brwa/Rebin in the first place . Clearly Amjad and Mahdi are shit and he continues to start them ! .
I can't believe that there are actually people here putting all the blame on the coach. Guys, come on. Be realistic. I will repeat it again. The issue is much deeper than the coach. Maybe it will make a short term difference if you put Mourinho there, but we need to improve our whole football system. Name me one player in the team yesterday who deserved his spot in the starting 11.. Even Saad Abdul-Amir was completely shit, and he is one of our best players. Let alone the local players. There is a lack of talent, lack of fitness, no depth in the team at all, no unity. Look at our league and compare it to them. Look at our facilities and youth development and compare it to them.. Add home advantage to it, a proven foreign coach, stability in the country and there you have it. How about this one guys? Is it also the fault of the coach? Iraq finished last in their 2014 World Cup qualifying group. Radhi Shanaishel or the coach in charge must have been the problem then? pic.twitter.com/hxPZ0nBOD6— Hassanin Mubarak (@hassaninmubarak) March 28, 2017 Iraq's 2002 World Cup campaign, Iraq didn't even reach the final rounds of qualifiers in 2006 or 2010!! But the coach is the problem! pic.twitter.com/DT1gAecmUC— Hassanin Mubarak (@hassaninmubarak) March 28, 2017
2014 qualifiers we fell to last because zico left and we had the incompetent petrovic in the last 3 games which were all very winnable. Picking out years where we finished poorly is disingenuous. Every time had it's own circumstances and facts that don't get reflected easily by looking at a table, like the time we got screwed by Qatar fielding an ineligible player against us in the 2010 qualifiers. What we don't lack, is players. No matter how weak our circumstances are, we always produce players. Some generations are more gifted than others, but we never lack talent, and this time was no different. Nobody is saying that it's just the coach, but there is certainly a big impact that the coach makes. How he trains the players, which players he calls, what line ups he uses, what substitutions he makes, etc... all of it directly impacts the play and the results. Facilities, youth development and league are all important, but we should not be looking at those things and saying that's why the saudis are beating us. As we are, we already produce better players than them. Better infrastructure will get us to the top of Asia, but we still should expect more than what we've seen.
Did we do well under Zico? I remember 1-1 Oman, 1-1 Jordan, 1-2 Australia and 0-1 Japan. Not much different from this campaign (We even managed to score against Japan and tie Australia this time around!) How can you say that we don't lack players? Those 'stand out players' in the Iraqi league are absolutely shit. Don't tell me you think the likes of Mahdi Kamil or Hammadi are good enough to play international football. This is what we invested in. We rely on expats, and if they lose form we are screwed. Changing a coach does make an impact, but this is all short term thinking. Without a proper league and good youth development, we won't get at the level of the rest of the teams. A coach has to work with what he has. And the players in the selection are more or less the standing out players in the Iraqi league + a bunch of expats. If you sack Shnaishel and bring a top foreign coach, I doubt he would suddenly qualify us for World Cups. There is more needed than that.
Rahdi is definitely not qualified enough for this job, having said that, Iraq needs a whole revamp from top to bottom, we're going nowhere at this rate.
Yeah I don't really get the love for Zico. We still failed to beat the two easiest teams Jordan and Oman and then threw away a 1-0 lead with 10 mins to go against Australia to lose 2-1 under Zico. They were 3 unacceptable results that ruined our chance of qualifying from the start. I mean I would still take him now as he's much better than who we've had since then but we never looked like qualifying for the World Cup under him. I think you two are both right in many ways. Iraqilambo is right in that we should be playing much better than we did yesterday under any coach. We would even expect better from a Hakeem Shaker team. I don't remember a single time we threatened Saudi in the whole 90 mins except from 1 corner. It was pretty diabolical yesterday. And Radhi has made some awful mistakes in terms of squad selection and lineup selection. He's the only Iraqi in the world who thinks Amjad Attwan should be a starter for our national team. And Suren is also right in that changing the coach is very likely still not going to be enough to qualify for the World Cup. Don't get me wrong Radhi has made massive errors and I am disappointed in many of the things he has done, but a) he has improved us compared with how we were in the previous round (we would never be able to challenge Australia and Japan under Akram Salman or Yahya Alwan) and b) who would replace him? Abdulghani Shahad, Basim Qasim, or an unknown foreign manager? None of them are much of an improvement. And I'd be surprised if we managed to get a good foreign manager after what happened to Zico. Who would want to work for the Iraq FA now after they couldn't even pay his wages. If it is still possible though, then I am all for it.