Abu Dhabi: Al Jazira will need to park three buses across the goal-line to stop Real Madrid in Wednesday’s sold out Fifa Club World Cup semi-final at Zayed Sports City from 9pm, according to their coach Henk ten Cate.
The Arabian Gulf League champions, who qualified to this tournament as hosts, have already made history as no other Emirati side has made it this far in the competition.
But Dutchman Ten Cate shattered the illusion that they could go any further and was brutally honest when asked about his side’s chances against the champions of Europe.
“We’re going to need three buses,” he joked. “Dreaming is OK but you must not become stupid. You have to be realistic, the chances of us getting a result are not that big, the difference in quality is too huge, but my team will fight until the bitter end and maybe [Jose] Mourinho can come by and put two buses in front of our goal as well,” he said of the Manchester United manager, who coined the phrase ‘Park the Bus’ thanks to his defensive tactics particularly in big games.
Asked who he was most worried about in the Real Madrid team, Ten Cate replied: “All of them.
“We won’t need to motivate them,” he added of his own players. “Some of the players, especially the younger ones, play PlayStation on the bus to away games and a lot of them support Real Madrid and they know all the players.
“It’s funny because those same boys who play PlayStation will now face Real’s stars. For them it’s probably a life changing situation.
“They look up to big players and they watch international matches on TV here every day and now they are facing players like Cristiano Ronaldo, for instance, who has just won five Ballons d’Or, and now they are standing next to him in the tunnel about to go out onto the pitch and play against him. I can only imagine what that means to those boys and they will be super motivated. I hope they won’t be too nervous, but it’s going to be all right I think.
“It’s a big surprise that we are sitting here as nobody expected it, we only believed and dreamed about it, it’s a big deal to be playing against a big club like Real, and it’s special for all of us. I think our achievement has put UAE football more on the map. It’s a small football country but to have participated and achieved will help give UAE football a boost.
“To get here with Al Jazira is probably the biggest thing I did, to be in a semi-final of a World Cup with a team from the UAE is something you can’t imagine, but we are here and we are proud to be here.”
