New RI coach to bring in Indonesians playing in Europe
The Jakarta Post, Jakarta | Thu, 01/12/2012 8:50 PM
Newly appointed national soccer team coach Aji Santoso says he intends to call upon young Indonesian players playing in various European leagues to play in the country’s final World Cup qualifying game against Bahrain.
“I will discuss it [the call-up of Indonesian players in Europe] with the management. If they are still under 23 years of age, they can be called up for the game against Bahrain,” he said Wednesday as quoted by tempo.co.
Indonesian under 23s currently playing in Europe include Arthur Irawan for Espanyol junior (Spain); Syamsir Alam, Yandi Sofyan, Alfin Tuassalamony and Yericho Christintoko for CS Vise (the Netherlands) and Stefano Lilipaly for FC Utrecht junior (the Netherlands).
Aji said that, as Indonesia no longer had any chance of qualifying for the World Cup, the game against Bahrain would be used as a tryout opportunity and see how U-23 players fared playing at the senior level.
The match will be part of preparations for the XXVII SEA Games, to be held in Myanmar in 2013, which would only include players under the age of 23. (awd)
