KUALA NERUS: Papua New Guinea have vowed to give a good fight against a highly motivated Harimau Malaya squad in the Tier 1 international friendly at the Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin Stadium here, tomorrow night.
This comes after the ‘Kapuls’ managed to force a 2-2 draw against Singapore in a friendly last Friday, thus looking to extend their unbeaten record in five games.
However, Papua New Guinea Head Coach Harrison Kamake said the outcome of tomorrow’s match depends on the ability of the team that combined young and senior players to execute the tactical approach.
“We are ready to take on the Malaysian team, my boys are really gearing up to having this game tomorrow and the outcome of the game would depend on how we approach the game…our boys are in positive minds in the last few days.
“But we respect all Malaysian players, we know how they play, Malaysia have quite quality players especially the captain (winger Mohamad Faisal Abdul Halim), we do respect our opponent,” he told the pre-match press conference here, today.
Tomorrow’s match is Malaysia’s second Tier 1 international friendly here after defeating the Solomon Islands 4-1, last Wednesday.
The Harimau Malaya are hunting for their fourth consecutive win in friendlies after also defeating Turkmenistan 1-0 and Hong Kong 2-0 in Johor, last March.
Based on the statistics against Papua New Guinea, Malaysia have won three of four matches with the last meeting in 2016 seeing the Harimau Malaya win 2-1, five months after losing 0-2 to the same opponents.
Only five players from the 2016 squad remain in the current Papua New Guinea team including captain Raymond Gunemba who scored the second equaliser against Singapore.
Gunemba believes his highly motivated teammates are capable of displaying the quality to compete tomorrow but at the same time aware of the rival’s ability.
“I think Malaysia has improved a bit from the previous team (2016) by watching their game against the Solomon Islands, they have quality players so it will be a tough challenge tomorrow, so we need to prepare well for that challenge,” said the 37-year-old striker.
Based on the world rankings, Malaysia are ranked 138th while Papua New Guinea 159th. – BERNAMA
