So, speaking of expectations, your team’s best season was back in 2016, when you were the underdogs, the outsiders, and nothing much was expected of you. That season, you managed to get over 70 points, and chased Muangthong who eventually won the title. Since then, you’ve done well, but never quite matched that feat because now, people expect you to win. So how do you deal with that added pressure, and how well as your team dealt with it?
As I said before, that pressure or that expectation is that high because we made it [that high]. We are victims of our own success. This is also something that is part of the business. I agree with you that sometimes, it is not too good if you have that kind of pressure where the people are saying you must win. Sometimes it is better to keep a little bit lower your expectations, but we know it is not possible because we’ve invested a lot of money, we have some very good players, we believe that we have also very good coaches and very good plans. So we have to take it how it is and we have to be better at handling that pressure. Or, not taking that as a disadvantage, but taking that as a part of the business. To go out there and say: ‘yeah, the people expect that – let’s go out there and do it!’ We have to do it. We have to take three points everywhere. It doesn’t matter if you go to Sukhothai, to Prachuap, to Chainat – you have to go there and get three points.
And of course at home you have to be strong, and we were very strong at home. I think we are the best team along with Buriram at home. But we dropped a lot of points away last season. Then you see this year 2016, we were unbelievable away. We won every single game away, but then we dropped the points at home. So we have to find that balance to say that every single game is a game where we have the quality to win, but we must present ourselves as a team that has the quality to win. I can go to Chainat and Prachuap, I can lose because again, they are all fighting for the points, but if I lose, I must lose playing in the way we want to play and giving everything for those three points. And sometimes, we were too relaxed! We were thinking “ok, we will do it, somehow.” Nowadays, there is no “doing somehow” in football. If you don’t really fight in before, you are taking the risk to lose.
Your side seemed to struggle a lot against teams which tended to park the bus last season. Which team will be the biggest challenge to your side in this coming season?
At this moment, I believe that there are five teams in Thailand who are all able to win the championship. Before, we always talked about Buriram and Muangthong because they are – from the tradition, from the fans, from the stadium, from the history – always the two top favorites. But, Chiangrai just showed that they can do it. Let’s see how they can do without William now because he was very important for them but they still have the other players, and they replaced him almost one to one. Buriram and Muangthong will continue to always be title contenders, we include ourselves there, and of course, now we can’t forget about Madame Pang and her Thai Port. They are very strong, they signed the best player from last season (Heberty). Just including that to the squad they kept together. In that stadium, the ‘hell’ to play at, it will be very difficult to get points there. So one of these five teams will win.
Of course, we will have some surprises. It will be very difficult to play in Ratchaburi, in Sukhothai, in Prachuap – especially Prachuap, with all this motivation from the cup. Sukhothai with their three players in front – Baggio, Ibson, and Evandro, these three will cause a lot of problems.
Last season, all these big teams you mentioned were very inconsistent. We went through many weeks where these teams just couldn’t win, and that was across the board for all the big teams. So was that because these teams are not performing well, or because the league is more competitive? And what do you make of the general quality of football last season?
Many people said that last season was the easiest to win because many teams were struggling. I am saying exactly the opposite – it was the most difficult season to win because the league is more competitive. There is no team now on the bottom with ten points, all the teams that were on the bottom were good teams who were fighting a lot for those points to not be relegated. The relegation battle was much closer, with more teams, so there was no place where you could go and know you would get the three points. Nobody could have that.
And near the top, it was the same. Before we had more dominance from Buriram or Muangthong, and in that case even they could not win because Chiangrai was strong, because Port was strong, because Bangkok United was strong. It is good to see a league like that. I believe it will be the same, and I [don’t like] a league where the champion starts and are 10 or 15 points ahead of the seasons. I don’t think that will happen because you have more teams fighting for the title and you have better teams fighting against relegation.
