Sports News of Thursday, 22 February 2018
Source: citifmonline.com
2018-02-22
Asante Kotoko head coach, Steven Polack
Asante Kotoko head coach, Steven Polack, admits that the team failed to perform to its best over the second leg against CARA of Brazzaville in the CAF Confederations Cup.
Kotoko arrived in Ghana on Thursday after losing 7-6 on penalties to their opponents following a 1-1 aggregate scoreline.
Polack says success in the penalty shootout was out of their hands but they could have offered more during the match.
“Not to get through to the second round was disappointing especially as we were the better team. We could have have been better on Wednesday in the second leg but we were not.
If we had played like we did in the first leg, we would have found the goal to go through,” Polack said at the Kotoko International Airport on arrival from Congo.
He continued: “I believe that penalties are a lottery. I keep reading stories that ask if we trained for the penalties or not. Of course, we trained for those.
Doing my job requires that we work on set plays but in the shootout, the goalkeeper has nothing to lose while the taker has all to lose.
Unfortunately, the CARA goalkeeper did a little better on the day.”
Had Kotoko made it, they would have faced Ben Guerdane of Tunisia in the second round of the CAF Confederations Cup.
Kotoko’s attentions will turn to the Ghana Premier League which starts on the weekend of March 2-4. They take on WAFA on the opening day of the new GHPL season.