Kota Kinabalu: Sabah Football Association (Safa) president Datuk Shahelmey Yahya expects Sabah FC to get a positive result in the AFC Cup, Asean zonal semi-final against Macarthur FC of Australia to be played on February 13 in Sydney.
He is confident that the players, who are back in intensive training for the past three weeks under Datuk Ong Kim Swee, will be able to produce their best performance in the tough away tie.
“Macarthur are a relatively strong team in the Australian League but we expect Sabah FC’s players to show a good performance against them,” he said.
Macarthur are currently in fourth position in the A-League table with 25 points from six wins, seven draws and three losses.
Shahelmey also called on the players to perform to their best first before any talk of incentives if Sabah FC are to win the match.
There will not be much changes in the team this season as almost all the first choice players from last season have been retained by the management with the exception of right back Rizal Ghazali who opted not to extend his contract for family reasons.
Foreign imports Saddil Ramdani, Ramon Machado, Gabriel Peres, Telmo Canstaheira, Miguel Ángel Garrido Cifuentes, Park Taesu and Ko Kwan-min are expected to play a big role for the team in Sydney.
Meanwhile, Keningau Football Association president Rafie Robert has been named as the new team manager for Sabah FC in the new season.
He was seen recently managing the Keningau team that won the Safa Cup football tournament by beating Nabawan in the final held here at the Likas Stadium.
Rafie, who is also Safa vice president, will take over from Datuk Ong Kim Swee who was also the team manager for Sabah FC apart from his role as head coach last season.
