On Wednesday, Nepal will play Sri Lanka against hosts Uzbekistan
In Group G of the AFC Women's Asia Cup Qualifiers, Nepal and the hosts, Uzbekistan, won their first match by a big margin as expected.
In the first match at Milli Stadium, Nepal scored 9 goals against Laos and Uzbekistan scored 10 goals against Sri Lanka. It was a happy start for Nepal's head coach Patrick de Wilde and captain Savitra Bhandari. Both are newly appointed.
The Nepali player, who is better known as 'Samba' than Savitra, has reached 61 goals after the victory against Laos, including 4 possible goals. The possible ninth goal against Laos in the 88th minute is not named after him, it is attributed to Laos defender Saismoni Anthapofon and is considered a suicide.
De Wilde said in a conversation with Kantipur on Monday, "This is definitely a good start for us in the selection." But still our focus should be on the game in front of us.'' His clear intention was that Nepal is not thinking about the match against Uzbekistan right now, rather the team's focus is completely on the game against Sri Lanka.
Uzbekistan's coach Kotran Kulabati has almost the same idea. She said after the 1-0 victory over Sri Lanka, "The result of the first game was good in many ways. Despite such a big win, I see room for improvement in the team. That's why we have focused our full attention on the match against Laos.
On Wednesday, Nepal will face Sri Lanka and Uzbekistan will face Laos. As both coaches claim, one fact is certain, the group winners will be decided in the final match. That is the match between Nepal and Uzbekistan. The group winners will qualify for the Asia Cup in Australia next year.
This game will be played on Saturday. Before that, it is expected that Nepal and Uzbekistan will also win their second match easily. Nepal faced Sri Lanka for the first time in 2010. Nepal's victory margin was 8-1. Since then, Nepal and Sri Lanka have played each other nine times. The winning team in all of them is Nepal.
In the last two matches in this match, Nepal defeated Sri Lanka by the same score of 6-0. The narrowest win so far is 1-0. If according to everyone's expectations, the match between Nepal and Uzbekistan will be decisive. If this match ends in a tie, the team that will be at the top of the group will be decided by goal difference.
If there is a tie in this too, the team that scores more goals in the group stage will be the group winner. Even after that, if nothing is decided, it will be applied, which team is ahead in fair play. If there is a tie, the group winner will be decided by a toss. However, coach De Wilde says, "I haven't thought about it that far." We will decide when the right time will come.'
