Ronald Koeman confident on his team win

Ronald Koeman confident on his team win

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The Southampton boss Ronald Koeman is hoping that the large number of supporters that are making their way to Bramall Lane to watch the Saints play in the Cup fixture versus Sheffield United get their reward.

More than four thousand supporters of Southampton FC are believed to go to that game.

According to Koeman, such big home support at an away ground would be a motivating factor for his boys.

Speaking ahead of the game, the Dutchman said, “It’s a long way away from home. But, still for people to travel and support and especially at a time when we have not been playing particularly well, it’s fantastic and we heartily appreciate that.”

“It’s certainly going to be a motivation. Such fans deserve to get something to cheer about.”

After maintaining the second position in the Premier League table for good 4-5 weeks, the Saints have lost the plot a little bit. They have had to counter some strong teams of late yes, but, they have not shown enough fight.

And, to add insult to injury, they even lost to Burnley the other day to slip out of top 4 in the league table. However, what’s good for them is that they can make people forget that defeat if they thrash Sheffield in this much important game tomorrow.

When Koeman was asked if this is the perfect chance for his team to put that Burnley disappointment aside, he said, “Yes. After a disappointing game, you want the next game to come as quickly as possible and the same has happened here. But, Sheffield is not going to let us breathe easy. They will be very positive and will attack in their conditions.”

If Southampton beats Sheffield, they will go to the Round of 4.

Swedes Draws Match With Wasteful Russians

Swedes Draws Match With Wasteful Russians

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Toivonen’s goal got a gutsy Swedish national football team battle back coming up with a 1-1 tie with Russians – yet the Russian team manager commented on a possible winning fate for the visitors.

The match was hosted at Stockholm Friends Arena.

The Russian football squad took lead in tenth minute of the match when Kokorin (Alexsandr) surged through prior to cutting back on right foot & rolling ball through Antonsson (Mikael) & past a desperate dive of Isaksson (Andreas).

The Swedes practically wasted the best chance to equalize3 minutes later when Durmaz (Jimmy) upended in box by Smolnikov (Igor) – however, goalie Akinfeev (Igor) threw himself into his right, pushing away Larsson’s (Sebastian) well-struck penalty.

In for injured Ibrahimovic (Zlatan), Toivonen pulled the Swedes level in 49th minute of the match, turning home Jimmy’s low cross prior to being replaced with Elmander (Johan) 8 minutes later post a hamstring injury.

With 4 points from first couple of game, the Russians are leading C Group on the goal differences from Austria and Montenegro- with the Sweden squad in 4th place on 2 points. Next Russia would be hosting Moldova & the Swedish would be greeting Liechtenstein.

“I am glad with my team’s performance but not at all happy with the result”, stated Russian coach Fabio Capello, who is known to be hard task master. We had enormous opportunities to score our winning goal. There’re couple of saves from keeper, a mistake from the forward & some moments which were actually quite dangerous for the Swedes.”

Erik Harmen (Sweden coach) appeared quite content with the team fate in the Russian match, in spite dropping couple of points.

“I am really glad with our very attitude”, stressed the Swedish coach. “We started our game well & we played all good till their goal. It was akin to a big blow into your stomach when the Russians were 1-0 up.”