(MENAFN- Khaleej Times) Sebastian tagliabue?s brace sets up teams victory in arabian gulf league match
Amer omar and dawood ali in action during the al wahda versus al shabab match at al shabab stadium on saturday. — kt photo by grace guino
Al shabab’s title dreams have virtually dashed following their 1-2 home defeat at the hands of al wahda in the 22nd round of the arabian gulf league at the maktoum bin rashid stadium on saturday evening.
“we have played a big game and earned the full points of the game” said al wahda’s defender hamdan al kamali later.
“we have no title dreams but our main focus is to finish in the top four to qualify for a spot in the 2015 afc champions league” he added.
However the second straight defeat put al shabab’s brazilian coach marcos paqueta under pressure and many of the club’s fans began to call for his removal.
Al shabab took the lead with edgar bruno’s header but the advantage was cancelled with sebastian tagliabue spot strike before the argentine attacker came again to slot in the winner in the dying seconds of the crucial tie.
And with this result a win and a draw could see front runners al ahli crowned champions of the rebranded championship from their remaining five starts.
The first half was a goalless affair with edgar bruno missing a sitter from close range by putting his shot wide of a virtually open goal early on. al wahda’s closest chances to breaking the deadlock came through a shot from distance by amer omar which flew just over the crossbar and a strike by salem saleh fizzing narrowly past the post. five minutes before the interval edgar bruno put dawood ali through but the diminutive midfielder fired straight at adel alhosani and less than a minute later al shabab went close again as carlos villanueva saw his shot turned behind in a low one-handed save by the al wahda goalkeeper.
Just three minutes after the restart edgar bruno clattered al wahda’s crossbar with a header from a corner as al shabab put a sustained amount of pressure on al wahda’s back line. in the 56th minute eissa santo did well to get back and clear edgar’s dangerous ball into the box but from the resulting corner the stalemate was lifted as edgar bruno headed home abdulla faraj’s delivery. moments later abdulla faraj made the wrong kind of contribution at the other end conceding a penalty for tripping mohamed al shehhi in the area and sebastian tagliabue stepped up to convert his 19th league goal of the season and equalise for al wahda at 1-1 in the 64th minute. and it was in injury time that tagliabue struck again with a splendid chipped right-footed finish to steal all 3 points for al wahda with his 20th goal of the season.
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