KELANA JAYA – Is the Bukit Jalil National Stadium ready to host the 2026 World Cup/2027 Asian Cup qualifier between Malaysia and Oman tomorrow?
According to Oman coach Jaroslav Silhavy, he was informed that his team could not train on the pitch because it was not ready.
“We know the field will not be good for the match, we have prepared the players physically and tactically.
“Unfortunately, we were informed that we could not train on the pitch because it is in a bad condition,” said the Czech.
Oman will now train at the MBPJ Stadium while the Harimau Malaya will train at Wisma FAM.
At the same time, Silhavy said that his chargers would have to prepare for every condition, especially with Malaysia’s advantage of playing on home turf in front of their own fans.
“This won’t be an easy match, and Malaysia have speedy and tricky players, and we will need to deal with them. As a team, Malaysia are very organised and difficult to break down, but we have done our research and we want to repeat our result from Friday.
“This is my first time in Bukit Jalil and I can’t wait to feel the atmosphere,” he said at the pre-match press conference today.
Recently, a video went viral on social media showing the pitch at the stadium in poor condition after British pop star Ed Sheeran played a concert to a sold-out crowd of 50,000 at the National Stadium last month.
However, Youth and Sports Minister Hannah Yeoh denied the authenticity of the viral images.
Meanwhile, national football coach Kim Pan-gon hopes that the pitch will be ready and in good condition to play on as promised tomorrow.
“I have not seen the pitch yet, but the technician promised that on game day it will be a good pitch. So I will wait for tomorrow and hopefully we will see a good pitch,” said the 54-year-old.
Earlier, the Football Association of Malaysia secretary-general, Datuk Noor Azman Rahman, told Scoop that the national body was satisfied with the current condition of the pitch after several inspections over the past month.
“There are a few patches here and there around the pitch which need to be fixed, but it can be covered within the next two to four days,” said Azman.
On February 24, Malaysia Stadium Corp released a statement stating that it was working with a foreign consultancy firm to ensure the field would be ready for the World Cup qualifier tomorrow. – March 25, 2024