Kota Kinabalu: Sabah FC head coach Datuk Ong Kim Swee hailed his players for keeping a clean sheet in their 4-0 thrashing of Sri Pahang FC at Likas Stadium, Saturday night.
It was only their third success in keeping their opponents at bay this season after 17 matches played.
Ong said after the match that the players need to maintain their consistency in the coming matches.
“It is not only the three points that we won but more importantly, we did not concede any goals tonight.
“We knew Pahang had been playing very well before this, but today we played even better than we had displayed before.
“However, the result doesn’t mean that we are now in a very good position. This is an achievement and we need to maintain the same performance, be more consistent in future games,” he said.
He also did not doubt the immediate impact brought to the team by newly signed import Ramon Machado who scored one and made one assist in the match.
“There is no denying that Ramon played well, but all the players also played very well tonight.
“They carried out their duties as instructed not allowing Pahang to take control of the match and it showed a very positive performance from all of them.”
Meanwhile, the match saw Sabah FC start well with the support of some 8,000 strong crowd despite the bad weather.
It took only the ninth minute for Darren Lok, who had just returned from injury, to score from close range courtesy of an unselfish pass from Ramon.
Ramon then added his name on the score sheet with a left foot strike after receiving a through ball from Saddil Ramdani in the 43rd minute.
The Rhinos’ defence continued to look more disciplined at the restart and Darren managed to score his second with a well struck effort outside the box with an assist from Irfan Fazail in the 65th minute.
Stuart Wilkin then extended the lead four minutes later after he pounced on a poor headed back pass by Azrif Nasrulhaq before lifting the ball over on rushing goalkeeper Zarif Irfan Hashimuddin.
Former skipper Baddrol Bakhtiar who was earlier said to have left the team made a surprise appearance late in the match to the delight of the fans.
He replaced Park Taesu in the 80th minute who also put the captain’s armband on him for the very last time.
The former Malaysian international is rumoured to have quit the sport in order to stand in the coming Kedah state election.
Ong said he respected Baddrol’s decision and hailed his contribution to the team since he joined in 2022.
“It is not easy for Baddrol to make a choice to retire and I am certain what he did is for the good of his own future.
“So we have to respect his decision and as we all know he is not just a very good player but also a very good leader outside the pitch.
“He played a huge part in Sabah FC during his stay with us, and we will definitely miss him especially in the changing room.”
