Meeting with former coach did not cause strike: National soccer team captain

National Soccer team captain Bambang Pamungkas denies that a meeting between him and former coach Alfred Riedl caused seven players to strike immediately after Indonesia lost 2-0 to Bahrain during the 2014 Pre World Cup qualifiers on September 6.

According to Bambang aka "Bepe", he met with Alfred a day after the match on September 7.

"So, the story that my meeting with Alfred Riedl was what caused the seven players to be unwilling [to play on the national team] if Wim Rijsbergen was still the national team coach was a great error," Bambang writes in his blog.

He adds that the players on strike had met each other and then informed the national team management of their decision close to midnight after the game. Bambang said he learnt of the decision to strike the next day.

"So, it is logically impossible that a meeting that took place at noon on September 7 could have affected a decision made on the night of September 6," he writes as quoted from tribunnews.com.