Soccer News of Sunday, 27 January 2008

Source: GNA

"My problem is cohesion", Coach Pfister

Kumasi, Jan. 27, GNA - The Cameroonian national coach, Otto Pfister says his problem with the team participating in the ongoing Ghana 2008 Africa Cup of Nations tournament in Kumasi is cohesion. He said he had not been with the team for long like Coach Claude Le Roy of Ghana's Black Stars and the Southern African Coach, Carlos Alberto Parreira.

Addressing a post match press conference in Kumasi after the team's match with Zambia on Saturday which they won 5-1, Coach Pfister said the team faces a lot of problems which were technical, ball control and play game among other things.

Otto Pfister, who opted to speak only French or Italian but did so in French, said: "I have a peculiar problem, I worked with the team for some days and so I have not had enough time to be with all the players as I worked with only 14 players and my problem now is with cohesion." Job Joseph Desire, who plays for OGC Nice in France and was elected Samsung Fair-play player of the match, said he was very delighted that his side won the match because they were under pressure to win the match and the subsequent one after losing 2-4 to Egypt in their first match.

The Zambian Coach, Patrick Phiri congratulated the Cameroonian national team for winning the match saying, "it was the first time my team played this way. Today they were scared of the players and the Cameroonian team took advantage to beat us. "We played well in our first match but today we can't understand and it is sometimes like that in football." The loss of the match by the team could be attributed to inexperience", Mr Phiri said.

"We had the upper hand, played with real physique but...it is destiny. "We'll play against Egypt in our last group match and it is going to be difficult for us to qualify."