Manama: Al Muharraq secured their place in the knockout phase of the 2016 AFC Cup on Wednesday with a 2-0 win over Syria’s Al Jaish that maintained the Bahraini club’s perfect record in Group D of this year’s campaign.
Ismaeel Abdulatif and Shohruh Gadoev struck as Al Muharraq moved onto 12 points from their first four games while Al Jaish remain in third place in the group having amassed three points from three games.
“We had a good tactical performance today as we managed to hold on in the first quarter of the match when our opponents put a lot of pressure on us,” said Al Muharraq coach Isa Al Hamdani. “We managed to create some chances using the quick counter attacks and we took the lead from one of these chances.
“We prepared well for the match and this helped us to concentrate on our performance tonight. I hope that our performance and the three points will give us a big push in order to get positive results in the league.”
Al Jaish pushed for the opening goal from the start, but Al Muharraq goalkeeper Abdulla Al Kaabi was in fine form, denying the Syrians on several occasions until Abdulatif opened the scoring 11 minutes before the break.
Ali Jamal played a through ball into the penalty area and Abdulatif was in the right place to edge the ball past goalkeeper Ahmad Madanieh and put his side in front.
Two minutes after the restart, Al Muharraq doubled their advantage with Abdulatif turning provider as he played a neat pass towards Uzbek forward Gadoev, who slotted the ball to the right of Madanieh to score and seal his side’s place in the knockout phase.
“Muharraq deserved to win today. They played with a fast tempo and they managed to score two goals from quick plays,” said Al Jaish coach Ahmad Al Shaar. “We created several scoring chances but we failed to score and we paid for this.
“After conceding the first goal we tried our best to comeback but we failed and this this also happened after the second goal as well.”
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