Al Ahly boss Marcel Koller revealed that him and his backroom staff worked for three days to devise a plan to counter Al Ittihad’s defending.
The Red Devils defeated the Jeddah giants 3-1 on Friday night to progress to the semi-final of the Club World Cup in Saudi Arabia, and Koller revealed that his side worked hard for that to happen.
“We played really well against Al Ittihad,” Koller told MBC Action. “We played well as a team, and that’s very important when you come up against a big team.
“When you play against a big team like Al Ittihad, who possess plenty of great players, then the most important thing is to play as a unit. They have a lot of players who can punish you when you commit a mistake, but we didn’t even allow them that mistake.”
Koller continued his words by saying that his side would’ve played the same way even if Karim Benzema had scored the penalty that was awarded to Eti at the end of the first half.
“The penalty miss wouldn’t have changed much in the way we played, we still would’ve went about in the same way,” he continued. “But, of course [Mohamed] El Shennawy’s save made a huge difference and we thank him for it.
“We worked hard for three days to devise a plan on how to make use of Al Ittihad’s defensive frailties, so we could score goals.”
