Al Sadd head coach Xavi Hernandez stressed on the difficulty of the upcoming clash against Al-Arabi in the semi-final of the Amir Cup 2021, which will be played on Sunday evening at Jassim bin Hamad Stadium.
Speaking during the pre-match press conference, Xavi said: “We are very excited to play Al Arabi, it is a very good team, and this is an important match for us in the Amir Cup.”
He added: “They have a great coach, and they have a very organized team. Our goal is to qualify for the final and win the Cup, and we must understand the importance of the match.”
“After leaving the Champions League, we must focus on the Amir Cup to end the season well. Our goal is to win all the local competitions. Regardless of what happened in the Asian tournament, we have to perform well and win the Amir Cup.”
The Al Sadd coach also said: “We know the difficulty of the competition, and we are preparing well in training in order to give our best in the tournament.”
About exiting the Asian championship, the coach said: “This is football. We went out of the Champions League because of one goal and we did not give our best, but we were not very bad. We must focus now on the Amir Cup after winning the League and the Qatar Cup. This is football, it has victories and defeats. We must accept it, and at present we have now a match against Al Arabi, and we must prepare for it well in order to win.”
He continued, saying: “We did not have luck in the Asian championship, we deserved more than that. I do not agree that local matches are easy; rather we are the ones who perform strongly. We played 6 games in the Champions League: we won 3, lost 2, and we drew a match, and as I said, we deserve more than to exit from the first stage.”
When asked about the rumours of his departure from the team at the end of the season, Xavi said: “This is not true and I am very close to signing a new contract with Al-Sadd and the talk of my exit from the team is just a rumour. I am very happy to work with the players and the club.”
