You said ‘try one more time.’ Last year, you seemed to organize a longer pre-season period because of the ACL qualifiers, but still lost to Hanoi FC. How did that result affect the players’ confidence leading into the new season?
Yeah, that was a big disappointment for us to lose that game. We know that Hanoi was a lot stronger than the people thought before. They proved that as well by going so [far] in the AFC Cup, to the semi-finals. They had all of these national team players from Vietnam who are doing very well until now, plus their foreigners who are good players.
But again, we are also strong, we are preparing for that, we got all these new players with a huge expectation, with three national team players – Tristan Do, Peerapat and Anon, plus Bonilla, who was the second top scorer in the league. So the expectation was very high.
I am happy that this year I don’t have this game. And I am happy now that Thailand has two spots to go straight to the group. Because your whole pre-season is totally affected because of this one game, or possibly two. You have to start earlier, you have already big pressure from the first qualifying game, instead of just preparing for the start of the season. It is a different kind of preparation. It is much better that you really give everything, and win the championship, and go straight to the group to be in the Champions League, than [it is] to play this qualifier. Because you have to start earlier, you have the first game before the [league] season, and you have this expectation already to qualify.
We failed even in the first game, but the reality until now has been that since this rule was there, not one time a Thai team went to the group stage. Not one single time. And we’ve tried 12 times and we’ve failed all 12. So, what does this cause you? Stress! Because you are not qualifying, and not only Bangkok United. We are even more stupid, let me say, to not even win the first game! But even teams which win the first game, we have to go to Japan, to China, to Korea, one leg away game.
This affected our confidence, we tried to recover from that and we didn’t have a good start in the league. Drawing in Sukhothai in a game we should lose, already getting us a little bit shaky. But ok, then we beat Muangthong, at home, it was good. But then came Buriram, and we lost in the last minute. So it was a very difficult start, and this season I am just happy we don’t have this game.
What did you learn from last season that you are going to take into this year?
We are changing a lot of things. We are changing the way we are training. It is important after all of these ‘failure years,’ even though I don’t agree that it has been a disaster. You have to see where we came from. When I arrived here, where was this team? And where are we now? We are victims of our own success. Because when we start that well now, to be second of third now is not good enough. But when I arrived here, we were 15th or 16th. It is a very good work from everyone together, but now we have come to a point where only the title is good. Everything other than that is bad. So that is a very difficult target. Very difficult.
So, we decide to change the approach a little bit, to change the attitude, to get out of this comfort zone for being in a very good club that is paying very good money for everyone, and we are saying, let’s try. We have to work better. Not harder or more, but better. This is what we are trying to do this season. We are trying to change the way we are preparing for the games. We are trying to put more rules and regulations. More fines for the players, to be more strict and more focused. There is no space anymore. Now we know very clearly.
There is no space for me either as a coach. I can’t lose three or four games in the first leg, for example – then I am gone. That is why I am saying we have to work not harder but better.
