Vella tells players to stay focused and avoid early goals

Its been a relentless two weeks for the Malta Under 21 Team prior to a daunting fixture as we host Belgium this Friday at 5pm at the Centenary Stadium. Coach Silvio Vella together with his technical staff, assistant Noel Turner, physical trainer Karl Attard and goalkeepers coach Simon Agius put all their efforts to get the boys ready for this tough match this Friday. Having conceded early in our last two competitive outings in Turkey (losing 4-2) and home to Sweden (losing 4-0), coach Silvio Vella has been clear in his team talk this week with his players - to stay focused from the very start, avoid stupid mistakes, and most importantly avoid to concede and early goal. Belgium will come for this match knowing that albeit being level on points with Sweden at the top of Group 6 table, they have an inferior goal difference, thus it will be their target in the 90 minutes in Malta to score as much as possible. Meanwhile, coach Silvio Vella also spoke to the new faces in this squad, some of them had to bow out of this 20 man final squad for the game on Friday, nonetheless the future is bright as they will have a prominent role as from November, when the U21 team start preparing for the new competition with a trip and a friendly match in Albania. The only concern for coach Silvio and his staff is that some of the new faces in this Malta U21 squad are really struggling to get a game with their club, hence that will complicate the situation as its difficult to promote a player and give him the nod to represent his country if he’s lacking fitness and not given enough playing time at his football club. Thus coach Silvio Vella is pleading with the clubs’ coaches to give more attention to our young talent and believe more in this crop of new players coming up who have been nurtured very carefully, but now its time when clubs and country together reap all the work in the past and start giving these players their chance to shine. Malta – Belgium U21 this Friday at 5pm Centenary Stadium.