Sabina hopes for more

Bangladesh National Women’s football team skipper Sabina Khatun hoped for more trophies in the future as head coach Golam Rabbani Choton hailed the process behind the trophy.

After beating Nepal 3-1 in the final of the SAFF Women’s Championship 2022, the women in red and green returned to Dhaka on Wednesday at noon.

After arriving, they completed an open-deck bus parade to reach the Bangladesh Football Federation office, where BFF officials, Sabina, Choton, and other players attended a press conference in the evening.

There, Sabina expressed her gratitude to the whole country.

“I want to express my gratitude to the 16 crore people of the country. We are overwhelmed by the response and respect we got today. This was the best day of my career,” she said.

Sabina explained that their hard work has brought results and hoped for more. “We have been working together in a camp for 4-5 years. We are just happy that we could bring success from that hard work, from the investment the board did in us. We want to gift the country with more trophies,” the Bangladesh skipper said.

Bangladesh head coach Choton said that they believed a long time ago that once his disciples came of age, they would win titles.

“Since we started our camp in 2016, which started with 35 players, we have been winning trophies at the age level. Now, we have 70 players there. But still, we were asked why we failed to win at the national level.

“But we believed that once these players reached the age of 19-20 and matured, we would get results. We had planned to win the title in 2024, but we got it two years early due to the hard work from the girls,” the Bangladesh head coach said.

Chairperson of BFF’s women wing, Mahfuza Akter Kiran also hailed the process that started in 2012.

“I always said that as we have strong age-level teams, we will have a strong national team in the future,” she said.

State Minister for Youth and Sports, Zahid Ahsan Russel, hoped that the girls would bring bigger honours on Asian and global levels.

BFF President Salahuddin informed that they were waiting on funding to play better Asian teams.

“We already have a program ready. Once we get the funding, we will implement that. My next target is on an Asian level. We have the planning ready, and we will try to play against teams like Thailand, and South Korea. Even if we lose, we will learn,” he said.