Kurniawan Dwi Yulianto
KOTA KINABALU: Head coach Kurniawan Dwi Yulianto has taken “full responsibility” of Sabah FC’s 0-1 home defeat to PJ City FC on Saturday.
The Indonesia trainer admitted that the Rhinos had failed to execute their game plan to the desired effect, which allowed the visiting side to claim all three points in the Super League tie at the Likas Stadium.
Striker Darren Lok scored the winning goal in the 53rd minute as he capitalised on an unfortunate slip from debutant North Macedonian defender Ristro Mitrevski to slot the ball into the empty net.
It was one of a couple of good scoring chances created by the visitors all night, which however proved enough to secure victory.
“Personally I am as disappointed as the rest of the coaching staff on the outcome of the match,” said Kurniawan.
“The way we played did not go as planned when training and during team meeting.
“We have done our preparation and the plan was that to be aggressive from kick off.
“We knew for a fact that PJ City played an aggressive game so we set out to play more aggressive than them but we failed to transform whatever we have worked on during training in the real game.
“It was difficult for us to get forward because they were compact. So, we just played possession football but without really being able to threaten their goal.
“I have taken note of this and to the players, I have to thank them for the hard work on the pitch.
“I will take responsibility on the defeat,” added Kurniawan after the game.
In the match, Kurniawan took a gamble by switching the squad formation to accomodate the four new foreign imports who were available to play after completing their quarantine.
However, with only a couple of days to train with the rest of the squad, it was understandable that they failed to produce the desired impact on the pitch.
“We had to include them in the match but the performance did not match the expectation.
“They have only completed their quarantine and for Risto and Levy (Madinda), they have only two days of training with the team.
“So we are not able to really see the quality or impact from our foreign signings,” he said.
Apart from Mitrevski and Madinda, the other foreign players making their debut were Saddil Ramdani and Sam Johnson.
Only South Korean central defender Park Tae Su, who has been retained for the new season, had started all three matches for Sabah FC.
The Rhinos are currently 10th in the 12-team table after three games and only collected one point from the 1-1 draw against Malacca United FC. The team lost in the second game to Kedah Darul Aman FC 0-2.
Meanwhile, Sabah FC left for Kuantan on Sunday in preparation for the next league game against 11th placed Sri Pahang FC at the Darul Makmur Stadium on March 16.
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