Gor Mahia coach Leonardo Martin Neiva praised his charged despite going down 3-0 at home against Al Ahly in the first leg of the second preliminary CAF Champions League match.The FKF Premier League defending champions suffered the heavy home defeat at the hands Ahly courtesy of goals from ;Ramy Rabia and Percy Tau’s double. In his adress to the media afterwards, Neiva had kind words for his charges saying that the scoreline does not reflect the true state of the game.“If you actually look at the game in general, Gor Mahia actually played well. We played good football but unfortunately conceded from our mistakes,” he stated.##NAJAVA_MECA_8334053##The 46-year-old Brazilian also said that they did their best to try and win the games including throwing all the caution to the wind.Naiva, who had started playing with 3 defenders at the back towards the end of the first half, commuted more numbers forward towards the closing stages of first half and in the closing one.“In the second half for instance, they just sat back and Gor Mahia tried their best to score. We changed the system again even in the last part of the game.We played a 3-3-4 formation, with Rooney and Chris as central strikers while Sharif Musa and Kapen operated as wide players, ” he added.CAFCL: Ruthless Al Ahly extinguish Gor Mahia’s slim hopes of group stages following heavy defeat in first legNeiva also gave his thoughts on the general perspective of the match and what might have gone wrong in the match.“In the first half, we started well and had an upper hand, especially in the first 10 minutes, then after that, we sat back and allowed the opponent to start enjoying the game,” he opened up.He however, admitted that mistakes creeped in and Ahly were quick to pounce early in the first half.”They then scored the first goal from our mistake and a second one within a minute because of our mistakes which made the game very difficult. I then told the boys to forget about the mistakes and start enjoying the game,” he stated.AFCON 2025 host cities confirmedThe former Vipers coach further revealed that the two first half substitutions where he took off Kennedy Onyango and captain Philemon Otieno were tactical.“They were purely tactical substitutions. It did not make sense to keep three center backs plus Philemon who was also there to be close to the central defense when we had already conceded two goals,” he added.Al Ahly will welcome Gor Mahia for the second leg at the Al Salam Stadium in Cairo on Saturday, 21st September.
