The falling short chronicles

In the last month or so, Bangladesh national football team have suffered two heartbreaks as they missed out on securing a final berth due to a late penalty goal.

Bangladesh faced Sri Lanka in their final group stage match of the four-nation Mahinda Rajapaksha tournament on Tuesday. The red and greens fell behind in the 25th minute, courtesy of Wasim Razeek’s goal. Nine minutes later, Bangladesh got a penalty, but Topu Barman, who had scored from the spot against Maldives to give Bangladesh three points, missed the penalty.

Bangladesh, guilty of missing a plethora of chances against 10-man Sri Lanka, got a lifeline in the 71st minute when Jewel Rana scored from a cross from Rakib Hossain, and it seemed like they would close the game out with a one-man advantage.

But that was not to be. They handed the hosts a penalty in the final minute of the regulation time, which Razeek scored to break Bangladesh’s hopes for a final once again.

After the match, Bangladesh head coach Mario Lemos said a lapse of concentration led to Bangladesh losing.

“(There was a lack of) concentration. In the last few minutes, I felt something was going to happen. We just stopped thinking we are going to win the game, whereas Sri Lanka were running and trying to win the game. We didn’t have that attitude. We were just watching and waiting for the match to end. And when you watch, you concede goals. And you give away a penalty at the end of the game, you deserve to lose,” Lemos said.

Lemos, who had a troubling time preparing for this tournament as players were unwilling to play and did not check-in for the training in time, added that the red and greens created several chances, but they were not dangerous.

This was not the first time that Bangladesh had conceded late to lose points. Former Bangladesh forward Alfaz Ahmed told The Business Post that the team lacked confidence, which was the reason for their last-minute shenanigans.

“We could not create a winning team in all these days. The team doesn’t have the confidence that they can win any game yet,” he told TBP.

Alfaz, a member of the 2003 SAFF Championship winner Bangladesh team, said that the team lacked quality players, restricting them from playing well.

“What I think is that we lack quality players. The team will bring in results when the team will have proper backups.

“We need quality backup players like that in every position because only then will the players give more than 100 per cent. But when there are no alternatives, I know that my place is secured, and I won’t perform well consistently,” the former striker said.

Bangladesh have lost or drawn several games because of late goals. On October 13, Bangladesh, in the dying moments of the game, gave away a penalty and conceded to see crash out of the group stage.

In 2019, Bangladesh found themselves 1-0 ahead in their World Cup qualifying match against India at the Salt Lake Stadium in Kolkata. But an 88th-minute equalizer meant that Bangladesh left with only one point.

Bangladesh also dropped a couple of points in their opening game of the four-nation tournament when Seychelles scored in the dying minutes to draw the match 1-1.

After their defeat to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh skipper Jamal Bhuyan took to Twitter to say that they will bounce back. He wrote, “We will bounce back stronger. We were just unlucky tonight.”

Bangladesh fans can hope of so. But with the same story being repeated again and again, there is not much to hope for.