Rejuvenated Ahli take on Sailiya
 
Al Ahli vs Al Sailiya
Saturday- Al Ahli Stadium – KO 8:15pm
Form – Last Five Matches
Ahli – WLDDL
Sailiya - WLLWW
 
At the start of the season, Al Ahli would have expected to be much higher up in the standings, than the 10^th place they currently find themselves in. They are in that cluster of five teams who are currently fighting relegation from the QSL.

Ahli went four matches without a win after QSL restarted from the winter break. However Ahli have been boosted with their recent victory over relegation rivals Al Khor.

“We breathe a little bit easier this week because we took three points from the match against Khor. That was an important step for us,” said Al Ahli Sports Club assistant coach Stanislav Moravec during the pre-match press conference on Thursday.

The five teams are currently lined up like this – Wakrah 23 points, Ahli 22, Khor 22, Kharaitiyat 21 and Qatar SC 20. And Moravec believes it’s not each point but each goal that is important in the matches to come. “For us, each point is very important. So these five teams are fighting for each goal, not just each point. We must be show good discipline on the field and I hope that we take something from this match too.”

Moravec believes that Sailiya are comfortable at 28 points and his team will have to show the hunger to do better. “They have 28 points, we have 22. So we know who needs more points from this match. They can play easy. Not under stress like us,” said the Ahli assistant coach.



Sailiya are far away from the relegation zone but they have aims to finish in the top 4 and want to take maximum points from the remaining matches to improve their standing.

“We are far away from the relegation zone. But we are not playing against a small team. Ahli have good players and they will be looking to win this match. They will be keen to get away from the relegation danger. We will try to collect the maximum points to improve our position,” said Al Sailiya Head Coach Sami Trabelsi on Thursday.

One of the main factors that Trabelsi wants his team to work on is to convert their opportunities. “We will try to do better in attack because we create a lot of opportunities but we don’t convert them. We need our players to show more confidence in that department. In our game against Salal, we had 4-5 opportunities but we couldn’t score. They had one corner through which they scored and we lost. We need more confidence in the area and the objective is to score more goals,” reiterated the Tunisian.