Szélesi: We can approach these two matches with confidence

His Hungary team will travel to Luxembourg on Wednesday for the first of two friendlies in the space of a week, the first on Thursday against their hosts before the squad flies back to Budapest to face Costa Rica in the Groupama Aréna on Tuesday 14th November.

Szélesi's squad, shorn of Attila Fiola and Richárd Guzmics through injury, met at the national team training centre in Telki on Sunday evening with the first decision of the young coach's short reign being that of whether to replace the afore-mentioned two players with fit replacements. In the end, it was thought the provisional squad will be large enough to negate the need for further call-ups.

"It is a huge honour to receive this call-up to be national-team coach and although I have huge expectations of myself I have never for one moment been afraid of the challenge", Szélesi told journalists at a press conference on Monday. "I have all the necessary information on the players and I've started my work with the team with healthy excitement. The players are partners in this work, everyone is motivated and is looking forward to the match. We only have a short time to prepare with just two days to work together, moreover, the squad is still complete as there will be those who only join up with the rest of us a day before we travel. I don't want to ignore the work that has been done in recent years so I will try to keep things simply and continuous in training and in matches. If the players' mentality and approach is the same as it has been over the first few days, we can face these two matches with confidence".

In regard to a question regarding new permanent Hungary coach George Leekens, Szélesi answered:

"I have talked a lot with the new head coach and he's asked me to share with him every piece of information known about the players, Hungarian football and domestic culture. For him, it is the most important that he gets to know the players as soon as possible, but naturally his opinion counts for a lot so I've asked his advice because he is an extraordinarily experienced person".

In the second part of the press conference, players Krisztián Németh and Zsolt Korcsmár answered journalists' questions, New England Revolution striker Németh saying it had been a long time since he'd joined up with the squad but he was very much looking forward to the two games.

Krisztián Németh: "We are concentrated and would like to put on a good performance and return to the positive atmosphere which signalled the appreciation of the Hungarian national team just a few months ago. From this point of view, these two matches are very important and of course it motivates everyone that we can already prove ourselves to the new national coach".

Zsolt Korcsmár: "At international level there are no easy opponents so we expect two difficult matches, but we would like to secure two wins and move forward with our game. In terms of the work with Zoltán Szélesi, we know how he sees football and he knows the players well so I'm sure that it'll be easy to work together with him".