Malditas fall short vs Thais

MANILA, Philippines - The Philippine Malditas bowed to Thailand, 0-1, and jeopardized their bid for the lone berth to the AFC Asian Women’s Cup in Thursday night’s Group B qualifiers at the Bangabandhu National Stadium in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Thai star Nisa Romyen, who connected four times in Thailand’s 9-0 wipeout of host Bangladesh the previous match, took charge again for the powerhouse nation, which however struggled to get past the stubborn Phl side.

Working off a through pass from Anootsara Maijareen, Nisa defeated Malditas goalie Maria De La Cruz to net in the lone goal of the match and put the Thais (six points) in the driver’s seat for the disputed Asian Cup slot.

With this result, Thailand only needs a draw in tonight’s match against Iran (three points) to advance. On the other hand, the Malditas (three points) have to beat Bangladesh (scoreless) by nine goals tonight and hope for Thailand to lose to Iran, to move forward.

“Right now we will need the help of Iran to beat Thailand, and we need to beat Bangladesh by more than 9 goals. The latter we will handle. The first part, we can only pray and hope that Thailand will not have luck on their side,” said Malditas coach Ernie Nierras.

He felt that the Pinays actually played better than the Thais and were a bit “unlucky” in conceding that goal.

“I am sorry if we did not win the game. I take full responsibility for the loss. The girls played so hard, but unfortunately luck was not on our side today. I am sure most of you have seen the replay of the goal. Just like all of you, I believe that the goal was offside. The lines person was not in line with the play, that is why she was not able to make the call,” Nierras said.

The Phl XI mentor lauded his wards for “dominating the second half.”

“We had 10 shots on goal to Thailand’s 3. If we converted one of those attempts then the situation would be different, but that is not the case,” he said.