Bangladesh coach Javier Cabrera hoped that his charges would provide an improved performance than the first-leg when they would take on mighty Australia in the Group I return-leg of the FIFA World Cup 2026 and AFC Asian Cup 2027 joint qualifiers at the Kings Arena in the city today.聽
The game will begin at 4:45pm and T Sports will televise the game live from the venue.
The gap of strength between the two sides is huge, as Australia (24th) are 160 places ahead of Bangladesh (184th) in the current FIFA rankings.
So, Bangladesh鈥檚 0-7 drubbing to the hands of the Socceroos in the first-leg in Melbourne in November 2023 was not a surprise.
This was Bangladesh鈥檚 biggest defeat in 25 matches against any side since Spanish coach Javier Cabrera took over in January 2022.
Graham Arnold鈥檚 Australia, which leads the group table with 12 points from four games, have already advanced to the third round of the qualifiers, while Bangladesh, who are already out of contention for the third round, are at the bottom of the table with one point from the same amount of games.
Aside from the humiliation against Australia, Bangladesh drew 1-1 with Lebanon and lost 0-1 and 0-5 against Palestine on home and away legs.
鈥榃e believe that not conceding early will give us a chance to win the game. We have dreams of winning the game, and that is our approach,鈥� Cabrera stated in the pre-match press conference at the game venue on Wednesday.
鈥榃e will definitely aim to improve on what we have done before [in the first-leg]. We are aware that we have consistently performed well at home against all of our opponents.
鈥榃e know how challenging tomorrow鈥檚 rivals are. We want to be in the game, want to be competitive, and to make things difficult for Australia. That is our objective.鈥�
On the other hand, Arnold was quite confident about his team鈥檚 strength and ability.
鈥橶e had very good preparation in Thailand, where we had four days of camp before coming [Tuesday] to Bangladesh. We are looking forward to the game and getting the job done鈥� removing all the excuses,鈥� said Arnold.
鈥極f course, we beat them 7-0 in November last year, but that鈥檚 all in the past鈥e know that when Bangladesh play at home, they are a very different opposition than when they play away.
鈥楾he boys are used to playing in warm conditions. We played Asian Cup, World Cup in tough conditions鈥�60 to 70 thousand people (crowd) against us...and we are used to it, and it will have no effect on us at all. It doesn鈥檛 bother me who the opponents are,鈥� added the Australian coach.
Bangladesh will complete their qualifiers round-2 campaign with the away tie against Lebanon at the Jassim Bin Hamad Stadium in Qatar on June 11.
