“It’s all over bar the shouting.” That’s an idiom often used when the outcome of a situation or event (or campaign) is a certainty, particularly when the outcome is known well in advance. Unfortunately for Armenia, that idiom could have been uttered well before their qualifying campaign came to a merciful end during the recent international break. Tournament hosts France (who’d already qualified) and first-time qualifiers Albania were the latest nations to defeat Armenia. Those results add to a run of 4 matches in which Armenia failed to score, and compounds a woeful 20-month spell that has produced a solitary friendly victory and 2 competitive draws from a total of 15 matches played. Needless to say, the other fixtures ended in defeat.
Those statistics do not read well, but not all defeats are created equally. Early in the campaign, Armenia competed well with results ultimately not going their way. However, the two most recent performances were very poor and had all the hallmarks of a team whose confidence had long since been obliterated. The players, as well as caretaker manager Sargis Hovsepyan, have played themselves into this predicament and need to bear some responsibility—a fact the home crowd let abundantly known with jeers and whistles ringing out after the defeat to Albania.
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Ruben Hayrapetyan should entice a reputable candidate for the coaching job, but he won’t because he doesn’t like to spend money on a quality manager. It’s a sad reality for the Armenian National Team: Direction under the current regime of the Armenian Football Federation will continue to lead in dissapointment and mediocrity. I want to see my team do well and show the world its capabilities, but our top players don’t have that motivation to do well for the team anymore because of who’s leading it all.
It is a pity that we are to hold the wooden spoon but just think it can only get better. We cannot only blame the coach, how about the players? did they perform to the best of their ability? surely there is something behind all of this. Maybe a new coach might do the job but in essence if the players cannot concentrate and use a certain amount of Armenian pride well! we will be in total disarray. Let us hope there is no politics involved in sport and we get a coach who will inspire his players. Go Armenia and don’t look back. Look to the future.
Ruben Hayrapetyan a.k.a. ‘nemetz Rubo’ taking the post?! The guy has been the biggest disaster Armenian soccer had since independence.
More tragically, there is an elephant in the room -disastrously low level of internal Armenian championship which is supposed to be the base of every national team. We are essentially 2nd from the bottom in Europe – far behind even our lowly neighbors. THAT’s need fixing first of all, and Nemetz did absolutely nothing there… nothing more than what he knows the best – corruption and nepotism