Oktay defends Gor players after Confed Cup exit

Gor Mahia FC head coach Hassan Oktay has absolved his players of any blame following their 5-1 humiliation at the hands of RS Berkane last night at the Stade Municipal de Berkane in Morocco.

The result completed a 7-2 aggregate defeat for Gor, marking an inglorious exit from the CAF Confederation Cup after they had become the first Kenyan team to reach the quarter-finals of the competition.

Oktay said he was ‘proud’ of his players given they barely rested after a botched travel plan forced them to arrive just hours before kick-off.

“I am just proud of my boys. Two days they did not have a sleep and they play like this, it’s not easy. All the drama that happened prior to this match of course affected everything. Late flights, 800 kilometres of travel, that’s not possible,” Oktay said.

The first batch of Gor players arrived in Morocco at 3am on Sunday-the match day and they could only quickly head into their hotels to catch some sleep before the second batch of the squad arrived later by road from Casablanca Airport.

Earlier on, Gor chairman Ambrose Rachier said the team was helpless and could do nothing to avoid the struggles they faced with players travelling on two bunches.

The Kenyan giants needed a miracle to overcome a 2-0 first leg deficit after they lost in Nairobi and Oktay, also concedes that they could do nothing but watch as one of his ‘worst moments ever’ unfolded.

“The second day we got the flight from Nairobi to Dohar after we had already spent some sleepless nights, another seven hours which we didn’t sleep there as well, nothing we could do,” the tactician added.

The first batch of Gor players arrived in Morocco at 3am on Sunday-the match day and they could only quickly head into their hotels to catch some sleep before the second batch of the squad arrived later by road from Casablanca Airport.

The exit now mean Gor will have to jet back in the country to only focus on league matters but many will feel their struggles would have been catalysed by some poor management that prompted to their failures in their CAF quarter final assignment.

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