THE Philippine Azkals absorbed a stinging 2-1 loss to host Singapore on Wednesday at the start of their campaign in the AFF Suzuki Cup 2020 at the National Stadium.
The Azkals conceded the two goals in succession with Hariss Harun scoring in the 62nd and Faris Ramli in the 64th. Amin Nazari quickly put the Philippines on the board in the 69th but the equalizer proved elusive the rest of the way.
Mountain to climb
Singapore now occupies the top spot in Group A with six points after a fitting follow-up to its 3-0 win over Myanmar, while the Philippines is in fourth at the conclusion of their first match of the tournament.
Favorite Thailand is in second place with three points along with Myanmar, which won over Timor Leste, 2-0, earlier in the day.
Azkals head coach Stewart Hall was left to rue the Singapore goals during what he described as the “three crazy minutes” in the second half, which were totally unexpected.
Hariss opened the scoring following a corner, and Faris made it 2-0 after breaking free from the Azkals defense in the second half.
“If you look at it, we’ve got beaten in three minutes. We had crazy, silly three minutes and thrown away 87 minutes of hardwork. But that’s football. You have to learn from that,” said Hall.
Hall was satisfied with how the players responded after a lackluster first half for the Azkals.
“We knew first 15 to 20 minutes it will be difficult but we set out for that and thought we coped with that very well. In that period, by the way, they had the referee as well which we didn’t think would happen but it did. That made it difficult and we dealt with it. And then, we came back into the game,” said Hall.
“And then second half, three crazy minutes. Two flick-ons from the corner and the marking wasn’t good enough. And then, a mistake in the halfway line where we couldn’t get the ball out on the transition and we gave it away."
The Philippines will face Timor Leste on Saturday.
Get more of the latest sports news & updates on SPIN.ph
NOTICE ON UNAUTHORIZED AND UNLAWFUL USE, PUBLICATION, AND/OR DISSEMINATION OF SPIN.PH CONTENT: Please be notified that any unauthorized and unlawful use, publication, and/or dissemination of Spin.ph’s content and/or materials is a direct violation of its legal and exclusive rights to the same, and shall be subject to appropriate legal action/s.
