UAE wrap up camp with friendly against Andorra

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UAE wrap up camp with friendly against Andorra
UAE players during a training session ahead of their international friendly against Andorra. -UAE FA

Published: Fri 17 Aug 2018, 9:54 PM

Last updated: Fri 17 Aug 2018, 11:58 PM

The UAE National team will wrap up their first camp in the run up to the AFC Asian Cup with an international football friendly against Andorra on Saturday.
The squad have been training in the Austrian city of Salzburg, the setting for the famous musical and film The Sound of Music, since August 1 during which they have played three friendlies against two Austrian and one Italian club.
But the friendly against Andorra, ranked 130 in the world, will mark their first fixture against an international team since March when they took part in the King's Cup in Bangkok, Thailand. The Whites had played against eventual winners Slovakia, Gabon, apart from hosts Thailand.
The match against Andorra will be an ideal work out for the UAE, ranked 77 in the Fifa world rankings, as they inch towards Asia's biggest competition on home soil in January and February next year.
"The international friendly against Andorra is of great importance to the UAE, especially since it is our first international match since March, when we took part in the King's Cup in Thailand," team supervisor Abdulla Saleh said on Friday.
The camp and the four friendlies are a chance for coach Alberto Zaccheroni to assess the physical fitness as well as experimenting with a number of players in different positions.
But Zaccheroni, who guided Japan to the Asian Cup in 2011, and his support staff have taken extra care in not exerting the players too much, especially since they were part of pre-season camps in Europe, with their respective clubs.
The UAE football season gets underway with the Arabian Gulf Cup Super Cup, the traditional season-opener with Arabian Gulf League champions Al Ain taking on Arabian Gulf Cup winners Al Wahda in Cairo, Egypt on August 25. The Arabian Gulf League will commence on August 30.
The squad will return home on Sunday. The second camp will be held in Girona, Spain from September 1 to 12 during which the Whites will play friendlies against Trinidad and Tobago on September 6 and Laos on September 11.
The third camp will be held in Barcelona, also in Spain, from October 6 to 16 with two friendlies against Honduras and Venezuela on October 11 and 16 respectively. The fourth and fifth camps will run from November 6 to 20 and December 15 to 31 respectively at home, most likely in Al Ain, with two friendlies scheduled.
Zaccheroni is also keen to co-ordinate with the UAE Olympic team, who are preparing for the Asian Games to be held in Indonesia.
The UAE were runners-up in the 1996 edition of the AFC Asian Cup held at home and finished third in Australia in 2015.
james@khaleejtimes.com
 

By James Jose

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