Aqil Nabiyev, head coach of Azerbaijan’s U-17 national football team, expressed dissatisfaction with the referee’s performance in the friendly match against Montenegro.
According to Idman.biz, Nabiyev told Report news agency that despite the referee’s frequent mistakes, his team managed to secure a victory in the preparation match during their training camp in Montenegro: “I have been working with the national team for many years and preparing youth squads for matches, but I have never seen such a disgraceful refereeing performance. Despite the unfair decisions, we defeated both Montenegro and the referee. Regarding the match, Montenegro has a strong team. Their respective age group championship has already started. They had won their last three matches, including against Slovakia, Hungary, and Romania. The opponent team was physically superior, yet we prepared well and analyzed them correctly. The match started as we planned. Although the home team tried to apply more pressure, we managed to handle their attacks. Thankfully, we won in the end.”
He also discussed the condition of the players in the training camp: “We have been together for about 10 days. Some of our players from Spain hadn’t trained for over a month, so we conducted special sessions for them to get ready for the national team camp. After the summer break, players often have physical readiness issues. As you know, special devices are used to measure players’ physical condition. We observed a significant gap between the previous camp and the current one. Most players suffer from a lack of match practice because their age-group championships have not started yet.”
Nabiyev expressed confidence that players from the youth teams will soon be called up to the main national squad: “U-16 and U-17 teams now train together. The results from recent matches are encouraging. The players’ confidence has increased, and they quickly learned what the coaching staff expects. I have been working with the U-17 team since March. If I had joined earlier, things would have been even better. Nevertheless, we have formed a very good team. I hope the players in the squad will soon advance to the U-21 and senior national teams.”
Azerbaijan’s U-17 team, currently training in Podgorica, Montenegro, won the first friendly match against the host team 1-0. Today, the national team will play a second friendly against the same opponent.
Idman.biz
