Chinese Li wants to return home to restore the players’ self-confidence

HONG KONG, Oct 13 (Reuters) – Chinese coach Li Tie wants his players to gain more confidence in playing the Asian World Cup qualifiers in front of their own supporters as they prepare to return home after spending a challenging two months in the middle. East.

The former Everton midfielder will take his team back to China on Wednesday after seeing the impact of the party crowd when his team lost 3-2 to Saudi Arabia ahead of more than 50,000 fans at King Abdullah Sport City in Jeddah.

China has not yet played on the field in the final stage of the mainland World Cup qualifiers due to COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, but Li hopes the situation will change soon.

“We really want to play our home games in front of Chinese fans, it’s a great motivation for our players,” Li said after his team’s third loss in four games.

The Chinese, who are trying to enter the World Cup for the first time since their 2002 debut, have played all four of their matches so far on foreign ground.

Pandemic restrictions in China have disrupted team preparation and forced Li and his team to settle in the Gulf from August and give up homecoming in their games against Japan and Vietnam.

China is scheduled to play its next two games against Oman and Australia at home in November, but a decision on where those matches will be played has not yet been made.

Although they won Vietnam last week, China lost to the Japanese as well as Australia and Saudi Arabia, and Li believes the lack of sharpness in the match will hurt his wife’s World Cup aspirations.

“My team needs to play more high-quality friendly matches and all players need to adapt to the fast pace of the last World Cup qualifier,” Li said.

“We’re working hard to fight for better results in the next matches.”

Reporting by Michael Church, edited by Christian Radnedge

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