2023-09-05 04:01:00
Murat Yakin met his players on Monday in Saillon to start the Swiss team’s season. With the hope of taking it as far as possible next June during the Euro in Germany.
77 days after the incredible outcome of the Lucerne match against Romania (2-2) with these two points lost in the dying seconds, Switzerland will deliver this Saturday in Pristina against Kosovo, the fifth match of their qualifying campaign, which will be will end on November 21 in Bucharest against Romania. It is to be hoped that this tenth and final meeting of Group I will only be of a friendly nature.
Switzerland must, in fact, close the case well before November 21. It will be recalled that the first two of the group will be qualified for the final phase. A failure is not really considered in the corridors of the ASF.
Limited room for maneuver
A success in Kosovo against a selection that continues to disappoint but will approach this meeting as its summit of the year will erase the quack of Lucerne. In Pristina, everything indicates that Murat Yakin will bet again on the trio formed by Xherdan Shaqiri, Zeki Amdouni and Ruben Vargas to force the decision.
Breel Embolo’s injury significantly reduces his room for maneuver in attack. In the middle line, the hierarchy also seems fixed with Granit Xhaka, breathtaking at the start of the season with Bayer Leverkusen, in charge alongside Denis Zakaria and Remo Freuler.
Everything is to ‘reinvent’ on the other hand in defense. With the presence of only one full-back on his list – Ricardo Rodriguez – despite the withdrawal of Silvan Widmer, Murat Yakin finds himself in trouble as during the disastrous round of 16 of the World Cup in Qatar against Portugal .
Who will hold the right flank of the defense? Edimilson Fernandes like in Doha? Or Manuel Akanji who has already held this position with Manchester City? The coach could have made his life a little easier if he had recalled Jordan Lotomba. Even if he lost his starting place in Nice, the Vaudois benefited from a certain playing time at the start of the season, 22 minutes in particular on Sunday against Strasbourg.
A fiery side
With this glitzy side which also makes all his charm, Murat Yakin sometimes takes malicious pleasure in playing with fire as we see with the non-selection of Jordan Lotomba. Or like with the presence in his list of Uran Bislimi. The Luganese half, who entered at the end of the match against Romania to honor his first selection, wore the Kosovo jersey last November during the friendly matches against Armenia and the Faroes, before finally choosing to wear the colors of Switzerland.
We dare not imagine the reaction of the public of Pristina if it were to be aligned Saturday by Murat Yakin… Even if the story is not the same, we will advise the coach to take a look at the reaction Sunday spectators from Lyon during the introduction at the end of the match of Bradley Barcola in the ranks of PSG to measure all that Uran Bislimi could endure…
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