On November 14, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will visit My Dinh Stadium, meeting the Vietnam team in the second qualifying round of the 2022 World Cup in Asia.
Right before the important match, the UAE is facing internal disagreements, with the focus of criticism being head coach Bert van Marwijk. Specifically, Mr. Mohammed Ali - a member of the UAE Football Federation, said that the Dutch strategist is not doing his job well.
According to the above leader, Mr. van Marwijk made many wrong decisions in the 2022 World Cup qualifiers, causing the Middle East team to lose to Thailand. Mr. Mohammed Ali requested the UAE Football Federation to hold an urgent meeting to analyze and point out the limitations of the person "stiring" the national team.
"We need to have a meeting with coach Bert van Marwijk before it's too late," he said. The race for tickets to the 2022 World Cup is still long, a meeting between the two sides is necessary and should take place soon to address the shortcomings of the UAE".
"The problem here is not the UAE Football Federation's interference in professional matters. But Mr. Bert van Marwijk himself also needs to take responsibility for poor performance, discuss the cause frankly and accept reasonable proposals," the UAE Football Federation member added.
The UAE team had a good start to the 2022 World Cup qualifiers with a 2-1 victory over Malaysia and a 5-0 "destroy" against Indonesia. However, Thailand's 1-2 defeat at Thammasat Stadium brought Mr. van Marwijk and his team back to "the ground".
According to the representative of the UAE football management agency, the 67-year-old strategist's "forgetting" of quality names has caused the home team to fail: "It is clear that the head coach did not call up the best players to the national team, this is the reason why the UAE lost to Thailand and lost the top spot in the group".
"We need to find our weaknesses, as well as make the right decision before the upcoming away trip to the Vietnam national team," Mr. Ali advised.
Before taking charge of the UAE team, coach Bert van Marwijk had led many leading European clubs such as Feyenoord, Hamburg SV and Borussia Dortmund. The Dutch strategist even led his hometown team to the 2010 World Cup final and only lost to Spain with a close score of 0-1.
In the upcoming Vietnam national team competition, the UAE national team will be without the service of No. 1 striker - Ali Mabkhout due to suspension. The 29-year-old star has a special influence on the national team when scoring 6 out of 8 goals for the Middle East team in the 2022 World Cup qualifiers.
