The Bhutanese Leading the way.
The Bhutanese National team is in Thailand for a friendly match with the Thai national team. The match was held early this week with the Bhutan who played a strong defense and saved a lot of goals but had to concede a friendly 5-0 defeat.
Bhutan coach Ohara Kazunori said “they played a fair good game but they lack in professionalism and they do not have the experience to play with the speed and timing of Thailand. He said “I was quite impressed to see the potential of the players, it was more than expected”.
The game started with a narrow escape for Bhutan when Thailand tried to score their first goal, the goalie saved the one for the team but after 5 minutes Thailand scored 2 goals in a row.
The first half was more or less lost for the Bhutanese team as they could not adapt to the speed of the Thailand team, but things got much better in the next half.
The Bhutanese goal keeper saved a number of goals to be scored by Thailand.
In one climactic moment in the game, a good pick-up by defender Pema, passed on to the striker Yeshi Dorji nearly turned into a goal but unfortunately he slipped and missed the goal. At 34 minutes the Bhutanese striker passed the goal to the mid-fielder but he missed again.
More disappointment headed the Bhutan team’s way when Nima Sangay of Bhutan was given a yellow card at 43 minutes before the first half.
The match slightly built after the second half, the striker was substituted and the Bhutanese defense was comparatively better compared to the first half. The score was Thailand 4 and Bhutan 0 for the first half.
At 40 minutes into the second half Goal keeper Man Bahadur was replaced by Tshering Dhondop.
The Bhutanese players did their struggling best till the last ten minutes, defended and prevented Thailand from scoring more goals. Manager of Thailand team Sascha said “I didn’t expect to see many young players from Bhutan. They played well and defended well throughout the game”.
The score ended with Thailand 5 and Bhutan 0.
The Bhutanese coach said “Bhutanese players have a lot of potential but we lack in professional players and also due to the poor facility in Bhutan”. In 2004, Bhutan played two matches with Thailand Olympic team and the under 19 National team, and has lost by 3 and 4 goals respectively. This was the first time the Bhutan national team played with Thailand National team. The friendly Football match was organized by Thailand Football Association.