Sabah counting on home matches to progress

Sabah are counting on home advantage to go the distance in the Malaysia Cup.

Drawn in Group A with Kedah, Perak and Johor, hopes are high Sabah will, at least, qualify for the quarter-finals.

Coach Justin Ganai said most teams, including Kedah and Perak, were not too comfortable when playing at Likas Stadium this season.

"We beat them both at home in the league and we hope for similar results when Perak play here on Sept 6 before we take on Kedah four days later.

"Since our stadium will be used for a rugby tournament later in the month, the FA of Malaysia has allowed us to play Johor at home on Sept 13 and that means we will play three consecutive home games in the Malaysia Cup," he said.

Justin said Sabah will have to make full use of their home advantage to book a place in the quarter-finals.

However, Sabah have not had the best of preparations for the Malaysia Cup.

"Several of our players, including right-back M. Sivakumar and midfielder Saffuan Ibrahim are out with long-term injuries and we only managed to bring in defender Fariz Azlan Mohd Isa on loan from Universiti Sains Malaysia.

"Another problem is we lack friendly matches with competitive teams and chances are, we will not be able to find some decent opponents with only about two weeks left before the Malaysia Cup kicks off."