Elkhan Mammadov: If penalty and red card were not given, game would be different

Baku. 23 November. REPORT.AZ/ If penalty and red card were not given at the beginning of the game, everything could have been different. Qarabag started match very well. In the second part of the game our team owned ball at 51 percent”. 

AFFA Secretary General Elkhan Mammadov told Report, commenting on Qarabag’s 0:4 defeat against Chelsea FC in the V round match of the Champions League group stage.

He also expressed his attitude towards penalty goal against Qarabag and red card given by referee Manuel De Sousa to Rashad Sadigov. According to the AFFA official, despite a minority of his collective that led by Gurban Gurbanov, they played confidently: “Experts will look at fairness of penalty. Until then, Qarabag played very confidently with attacking. Team played like a real home team. This is very pleasing”.

Mammadov also spoke about organization of the game. He said that such matches will be a good experience on the eve of the Europa League and Euro 2020 Group Games, which will be held at the Olympic Stadium in 2019: "The more such games played both teams play very well in the stadium. We also gain experience as AFFA. The number of fans in the match was more than 67,000. Everything was well organized. We will try our best. We will do our best to serve our fans better. We will benefit from this experience at the 2019 European League finals and EURO 2020 in Baku Olympic Stadium”. Some of the participants of the FIFA Executive Soccer Summit held in Baku on November 22, accepted the invitation of AFFA and watched Qarabag - Chelsea match. AFFA Secretary General said that the guests were satisfied with the match, atmosphere in the stadium: "They congratulated us on this kind of encounter. Representatives from not only European countries, but also from Africa and Asia attended the summit. We took advantage and invited them to the game".