Clarets win sees them in with chance of reaching Champions League group stages

Matt Jones - Editor 00:45 09/05/2016
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  • Wahda defender Ahmed Rashid challenges Bani Yas' Saleh Almenhali

    Ismail Matar will hopefully get to spend his 20th year at Al Wahda gracing the AFC Champions League after he fired his hometown club back into a play-off for Asia’s premier club competition for the second time in three years.

    The veteran has been at Al Nahyan Stadium since he was a teenager and spent his entire 15-year senior career with the Abu Dhabi outfit, so it was fitting that someone who knows what it’s like to play in the elite tournament performed such a guiding role.

    The 3-0 result against Bani Yas granted Javier Aguirre’s side third spot as the Arabian Gulf League reached its conclusion, securing their shot to avenge 2015’s defeat in the eliminator against Al Sadd.

    The Mexican, who delivered on his key aim when he was unveiled as Wahda head coach last June, was rightly delighted with his debut campaign.

    “Of course I am happy with the team’s achievements this season,” said Aguirre.

    “We won a trophy (Arabian Gulf Cup) and third in the league. And also Sebastian Tagliabue finished as the league’s top scorer.”

    The margin of victory might have looked convincing, but it was anything but.

    Wahda held on, grimly at times, to Matar’s 26th minute opener before goals from Chang-woo Rim and Sebastian Tagliabue inside the final three minutes put a gloss on victory.

    “It wasn’t a good game for us but, at the end, it was the result that mattered,” added the former Atletico Madrid manager.

    Opposite number Dr Abdullah Misfer congratulated Aguirre’s men.

    The former UAE Under-23 head coach said: “Congratulations to Wahda for finishing third. We allowed the youngsters to play in this game and they really pushed Wahda hard for a major part of the match. We will now focus on our President’s Cup quarter-finals.”

    Matar, the 33-year- old forward, was part of the Wahda team that last participated in the Champions League proper five seasons ago. Only two other players in last night’s 18-man squad can say the same.

    He was also in the starting 11 when Wahda reached their peak, losing 3-1 on aggregate to Sepahan in the 2007 semi-finals.

    Matar, recalled to Mahdi Ali’s UAE squad earlier this year, doesn’t score many goals these days, but saved arguably his most crucial in the Claret shirt for when it really mattered.

    It wasn’t his finest effort, his shot taking a wicked deflection off a defender to wrong-foot Sky Blues stopper Mohamed Khalaf.

    The prodigal son also orchestrated the killer blow, swinging in a perfect corner for South Korean international Rim Chang-woo to glance home in the 88th minute to make it 2-0.

    For the majority of the night it looked as if Tagliabue, whose goals are a large part of why Wahda have the chance to play in the Champions League next season, would end his campaign on a sour note.

    After seeing one effort headed off the line, another saved by Khalaf and a third hit the crossbar, however, the Argentine sealed the win with a 25th strike of a superb individual campaign.

    In the end, with closest challengers Al Wasl losing 1-0 at Al Shabab, Wahda sauntered to a third spot that had long been deserved.

    Elsewhere, Al Nasr’s hopes of playing in next season’s AFC Champions League are on the line after their 3-1 victory over Fujairah saw them finish a disappointing fourth in the Arabian Gulf League.

    The result relegated last night’s opponents and also saw the hosts miss out to Al Wahda in the race for third place and its guaranteed play-off berth for the 2017 edition of Asia’s premier club tournament. But not all hope is lost.

    Nasr – who will meet Tractor Sazi in this year’s ACL’s round of 16 – can still reach the elite competition again if either Al Ahli or Al Ain, who’ve already booked their passage to the event, win the President’s Cup.

    At Al Maktoum Stadium, Jires Kembo-Ekoko put the hosts 2-0 up, before Hassan Maatouk reduced the deficit from the penalty spot to give his team hope. But Luis Jimenez made sure of the points late but it was too little too late.

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