Donis blames amount of time in charge of Saudi Arabia for draw with Uruguay

[p]Donis replaced Herve Renard in late April, and their ‌Group H opener at Miami Stadium was his first competitive ‌game with the team after three pre-tournament friendlies.[/p][p][b]"For us, within three weeks we've ‌been trying to set up our game, build up our game ‌and have a better spirit," said Donis.[/b][/p][p][b]"When we're faced with certain opponents, getting one point is a positive event and this is a booster for our psychology.[/b][/p][p][b]"Currently, ‌I'm trying to learn my team, I'm trying ⁠to learn my players and get ‌to know them. I see how they react and behave, and what I've ​seen is that, due to the lack of time, we cannot be flexible during the match.[/b][/p][p][b]"We know how to play 4-4-2 ​or 4-3-2-1, but we must be able to play with three midfielders or with five defenders. At the moment, unfortunately, we're not that ⁠flexible. It takes time to ​get to know how to do it."[/b][/p][image alt="Saudi Arabia - Uruguay match momentum" id="167fdda9-ef2d-4d87-b5d2-c0be69685806" credit-line="Opta by StatsPerform" guid="fd833a95-f585-4b60-afbd-186b9c95b8c6" original-width="1080" original-height="1080" /][p]The Saudis were on top for much of the first half and took the lead in the 41st minute when [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/player/al-amri-abdulelah/rZSEa8BL/"]Abdulelah Alamri[/a] capitalised on an error by [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/team/uruguay/xMk44orG/"]Uruguay[/a] goalkeeper [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/player/muslera-fernando/65awSbS3/"]Fernando Muslera[/a].[/p][p]Uruguay ‌dominated after the interval and forced the Saudis to defend deep. With 10 minutes remaining, [a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/player/araujo-maximiliano/4UXCOm0L/"]Maxi Araujo[/a] slid in to score a deserved equaliser.[/p][p][b]"We can say in the first half we had good control over the play, and we had opportunities to score without being very decisive," said Donis.[/b][/p][p][b]"In the second half, if someone analyses it, one can say that a possible scenario was that we had the lead and we thought mostly defensive. We had already scored, and we wanted to ‌keep that.[/b][/p][p][b]"Were we, perhaps, tired in the second half? It appeared to ​be that in the second half we didn't have the ‌same intensity. Our opponent was able to go deeper into our half.[/b][/p][p]"We didn't show enough self-confidence to keep possession of the ball in order to change their tempo, so that meant that we had pressure near our box. Thankfully, we had an excellent goalkeeper ⁠and an excellent defence today.[/p][p]"I'm trying ⁠to learn my team better ‌and to see how we think."[/p][p][a href="https://www.flashscore.ca/game/soccer/saudi-arabia-biSY8ox4/uruguay-xMk44orG/?mid=Olnboqfd"]Check out the match report from the 1-1 draw with Flashscore.[/a][/p][infobox id="4ccc1b10-d68f-4c97-bcf4-5e613c17c2e3" /]