Maldives departs without coach

Male', MALDIVES - Maldives national team has departed to Doha, Qatar for the AFC Asian Cup Qualifying playoff match against Yemen without head coach Ricki Herbert.

Maldivesoccer.com can confirm that the new management of Football Association of Maldives has reached an agreement on mutual consent with coach Ricki Herbert to terminate the contract with the former New Zealand coach, who has guided them in 2010 FIFA World Cup. It is believed that Ricki Herbert will leave Maldives on Monday.

FAM has called the media for a press conference scheduled for today morning at 1100 hours. It is believed that they will brief about the termination of the contract with the coach.

Assistant coach Ismail Mahfooz (Imma) will work as the care taking coach against Yemen in the second leg. Maldives lost to Yemen by 2-0 on Thursday night.

Under the reign of Ricki Herbert Maldives played 17 games in all completions including FIFA World Cup qualifiers and SAFF Championship and won only 7 games. Maldives lost 9 games while managed to get a draw against Bahrain U23 in Bangabandhu Gold Cup. The most surprising defeat under Ricki Herbert was the 4-1 defeat against Nepal which is the first defeat to Nepal in the last 17 years.

Maldives will play against Yemen in the AFC Asian Cup Qualifying playoff on 7th June.