Photo: CAF

Score

Al-Merreikh's Zambian international striker Jonas Sakuwaha congratulated his colleague on their fighting spirit and tightened performance that enabled them to snatch a point from their arch-rivals Al-Hilal in Sudan derby of the 2012 Orange CAF Confederation Cup group A.

Sakuwaha told Cafonline.com that they got a good result despite playing with ten men for a good part of the match and are now looking forward to a home win over Al-Ahly Shandy in their next match in this competition.

How do you describe the game?

We got a good away result 1-1 draw. This was a hard fought battle and we did it despite playing with ten men after the sending off.

What were your expectations before the kick off?

For me I expected to win. We have lost a part of our strategy with the sending off . We faced difficulties after Badredine Galag was sent off as you saw we accumulated a number of yellow cards in part due to the situation ten men had to deal with.

What is the reaction of Al-Merreikh players after this result?

I think all players and everyone happy with this result, considering the situation we found ourselves in, otherwise if it was 11 players 11, it would have been different, but we accept this result now.

What is your assessment of how Al-Merreikh played?

I think everyone played well and did their best. It was very tough game, we must not forget it is our first away match, not at our stadium, and with played it with ten men, so it was difficult for us. I thank the guys on that performance, as every one of them did his best.

How did you Al-Hilal's performance ?

Al-Hilal played attacking football straight from kick off . Their strongest point is the attack line. I can guess that our defenders stayed alert and did a great job to restrict them to just one goal.

What about next match against Al-Ahly Shandy?

We are just going back to use our same system and approach. What I mean we will play 11 players against 11in the next matches. In next match everyone would like to win against Al-Ahly Shandy, all of us will play for the three points so that we can get close to that semi-final place.