After returning from the Futsal World Cup qualifiers, we spoke to Alan Parker about his goal against England, preparation for the tournament and achievements with South United.

Firstly. Alan described how the trip to Latvia was “Well for starters, I would like to say that it has been an amazing trip. I feel that I have gained valuable experience which will benefit myself and my team-mates in future competitions.”

Gibraltar flew out to Latvia on Saturday 26th January, four days before their opening game against England. We asked how those extra days of preparation helped the team, “I think travelling earlier gave us more time to prepare the games but also helped us to focus more, instead of being in Gibraltar and flying to Latvia two days before the game.”

Alan scored in Gibraltar’s opening 4-1 defeat to England followed by 9-0 & 11-0 defeats to hosts Latvia and Cyprus respectively. Alan reflected on his individual performances, “Scoring a goal for Gibraltar is always important and in that moment, it felt amazing. However, the result against England wasn’t what we wanted but our performance was excellent. We all tried our best and gave our all for Gibraltar, the results weren’t great but i’m proud enough with that. Hopefully the experience we’ve gained from this tournament will help us get better results next time around.”

Alan’s focus now turns to the domestic league, with South United sitting fourth in the First Division – we asked how his team will do for the rest of the season, “We have two games left and then the league splits into two for the playoffs. We just take things one match at a time and try our best to finish in the top four and qualify for a spot in Europe next season which is our aim.”

Gibraltar kick off their FIFA Futsal World Cup qualifying campaign this afternoon against England – we caught up with head coach Jose Carlos Gil Prieto as he talks about the preparation leading up to the tournament, what he hopes to achieve and much more.

After being pitted in Group A with England, Cyprus and hosts Latvia; we asked Jose Carlos on his thoughts on the draw – “After 4 years working for the GFA Futsal, first as an assistant to Peter Moreno and this last year & a half as head coach – I could say that the effort made by these players and technical staff has been incredible. With Christmas in between, we have carried on training, despite the problems we always encounter with the allocations (despite the great effort made by the Gibraltar FA). The mix of experience with youth, existing in this team, is probably the best which I have worked with, they are a good group of players and we hope that all the hard-work put in will be reflected in the matches.”

We asked how the preparation has gone in the lead up to the Futsal World Cup qualifiers, “In fact, the preparation has been quite good except for the injuries sustained to Mark Moxham and our captain Andrew Lopez, who are unable to travel with the squad. As I said before, preparation has been excellent especially during December and January as we’ve had practically 20 players, which, on previous occasions, it was very difficult for us to create a stable group. This shows that Futsal continues to grow in Gibraltar as there’s more interest in our selection, both young and experienced players.”

During the UEFA Nations League campaign, Jose Carlos worked closely with Julio Ribas – we asked how it’s benefited him as a coach, “To be honest, it has helped me a lot but not only in the days before the games, but in the day to day of our work (preparation of training, talks, etc). Working with someone like Julio, who has worked at the highest level has been a real eye opener for me. Lastly, I would like to thank Julio and the members of the Gibraltar FA for giving me this precious opportunity.”

Lastly, Jose Carlos gave an insight into what he hopes to achieve from this tournament which sees Gibraltar play three games in four days – “Regarding what I hope to achieve in this qualifier; we are all very clear that the main and most important thing is to give our maximum in each game, to compete at the highest level and continue acquiring international experience. In the result, many other details intervene as can be the rival, luck, etc .., But that does not prevent, that no one will take from us, the immense illusion with which we travel, and although we have to be realistic of the harshness of the rivals, in our mind there is always the maximum demand, which is to get positive results and continue scoring, and for the first time in the history of our federation progress to the next round of the World Cup.”

Gibraltar started the UEFA Futsal Euro 2018 qualifying campaign with an 8-1 loss against Montenegro at the Tercentenary Sports Hall tonight.

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