The reason Indonesia only won 1 match on the September FIFA Matchday

The reason Indonesia only won 1 match on the September FIFA Matchday

Jakarta, Beritasatu.com – Friendly matches titled FIFA Matchday are generally held twice. However, the Indonesian national team will only compete once on the September 2023 FIFA Matchday against Turkmenistan.

Even though it’s only a friendly match, FIFA Matchday is important for the national team to gain points and boost the FIFA ranking.

PSSI Chairman, Erick Thohir, gave an explanation regarding the Indonesian national team match which was only held once on the September 2023 FIFA Matchday. He said this was inseparable from the qualification for the 2024 U-23 Asian Cup in Solo which was scheduled to be close to the FIFA Matchday.

“Of course we cannot fill FIFA Matchday as before which could fill two matches, because we must remember that we are hosting the U-23 Asian Cup in Solo, namely on 9 and 12 (September),” said Erick in a press conference, Thursday (20/7/2023).

Erick also explained that the composition of the Indonesian national team players and the U-23 national team were not much different, so PSSI had to be careful in setting the FIFA Matchday match schedule.

“We will compete and the composition of the national team is actually a lot of young people, in fact, under the U-23s as we saw against Argentina. So that means we will only fill in 1 match, namely on the 8th (September) against Turkmenistan at Gelora Bung Tomo Surabaya,” explained Erick.

The Indonesia vs Turkmenistan national team match on FIFA Matchday will be held on 8 September 2023. Meanwhile, the U-23 national team will be in action in the 2024 U-23 Asian Cup qualifiers on 9 and 12 September 2023.

In the qualifying event for the 2024 U-23 Asian Cup, the U-23 National Team was drawn in Group K along with U-23 Turkmenistan and U-23 Taiwan.

Regarding the Turkmenistan senior national team and Turkmenistan U-23 national team who will be coming to Indonesia, Erick admitted that he did not know whether the composition of the two teams would be similar.

“What is certain is that there is an agreement with Shin Tae-yong that on the 8th we (Indonesian national team) will play against senior Turkmenistan. Then according to the calendar, (Indonesian U-23 national team) will play against Taiwan (U-23) on the 9th, then against Turkmenistan (U-23) on the 12th. So there is still a break, but of course we will see about the details of the players,” explained Erick.

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