Lebanon seeks another upset in RI tie

Lebanon seeks another upset in RI tie

Musthofid, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta

The Lebanon U-23 soccer team looks eager to repeat its surprise
elimination of Jordan when it takes on Indonesia in the second
round of the 2004 Olympics qualifying matches here on Saturday.

"We are very upbeat after the victory over Jordan. We
surprised many people in Lebanon and also in Jordan," French
coach Richard Tardi said at a media briefing held upon the team's
arrival at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport on Thursday.

Lebanon held Jordan to a 1-1 draw in Amman on April 19, and
made it to the second round on the away goal rule, after the
first leg match in Beirut ended in a 0-0 draw.

Tardi hinted that the Jordanian upset should provide a boost
to his team, of which the majority are young players.

Asked about an optional gamesmanship, in which they would
simply look for a draw here and try to capitalize on their host's
status in the return match within a month, Tardi said, "We play
two games, and we must qualify after two games. We'll try to take
the best result."

The Lebanese team arrived with 19 players, including Abbas
Atwi, their scorer in the tie with Jordan. Prior to leaving for
Indonesia, said Tardi, the team had been in three friendly games,
winning twice in Qatar and losing in the United Arab Emirates.

Meanwhile, the Indonesian team members, according assistant
coach Bambang Nurdiansyah, were likely to opt for fast moves to
challenge the tall Lebanese,

Beirut's second-leg match is to be played on June 6, and the
Indonesia-Lebanon tie is one of the 12 fixtures in the Asian
qualifiers, with the winners due to advance to the final stage
between March and early May in 2004.

While the majority of pairings will play their matches on
either May 1 or May 3, three pairings will have to wait for the
results from first-round matches that have been rescheduled due
to the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) outbreak.

The rescheduled matches are: Hong Kong-Sri Lanka, Chinese
Taipei-Singapore and Iraq-Vietnam. All three will be played on
Sept. 10, according to footballasia.com.