Hamza wants to repay supporters' love by winning the SAFF trophy

Star midfielder Hamza Dewan Chowdhury wants to end a long 23-year wait and bring home the SAFF Championship trophy, as a way of repaying the unstinting love of Bangladeshi football supporters.

In their second match of the tournament, Bangladesh will face Sri Lanka at 8pm on Wednesday (11 November) at the National Stadium in Paltan; the match will be broadcast live on T-Sports.

Ahead of this important match, Hamza spoke to the media on Tuesday about the team's preparation and goals.

He said there is no extra mental pressure or frustration over the recent missed chances in the striking positions of the team's attack.

Expressing his full faith in his teammates, he said the team is now regularly creating goalscoring chances and that they will very soon be converted into the desired goals.

The star said he is not interested in thinking about the previous match between Sri Lanka and Bhutan or in reacting to various comments made by the opposition coach. His clear message is that, rather than thinking about what other teams are doing, the team's main priority now is to play its own natural best football on the field and secure the win.

Emphasising the team philosophy of football, Hamza said it is not a one-person game but a complete team game, and that as a team they are improving step by step.

He does not want to see the unprecedented excitement and hype among football fans since he joined the national team as merely his own personal success.

Instead, he described the moment when expatriate talents such as Samit Som, Farhan Ali Wahid and Fahmidul Islam joined the national team at the same time as him as perfect timing.

But he believes the time has now come to stop floating on the talk and excitement off the field, and to win the trophy with performance on the field.

The midfielder also recalled with emotion the regular support he received from expatriate Bangladeshis while playing professional football in England.

Expressing deep gratitude for this sincere love from the people of the country and expatriate supporters around the world, Hamza said they are fully united in their resolve to repay that love by winning the SAFF Championship again after 2003 and presenting the trophy to them.