Sport | Football
UAE keep hopes alive with win over Yemen
The UAE revived their hopes of reaching the semifinals of the 18th Gulf Cup when they beat Yemen 2-1 on Saturday to take second place in the group with three points from two matches.
- By Yasir Abbasher, Staff Reporter
- Published: 23:36 May 3, 2009
- The UAE's Adel Abdul Azeez and Rashid A Mohammad fight for possession with Yemen's Akram Mahmoud Abdu (centre) during their group league match for the Gulf Cup at the Mohammad Bin Zayed Stadium yesterday.
- Image Credit: Ahmed Kutty/Gulf News
Abu Dhabi: The UAE revived their hopes of reaching the semifinals of the 18th Gulf Cup when they beat Yemen 2-1 yesterday to take second place in the group with three points from two matches.
The UAE applied the 4:4:2 formation while Yemen opted for a more defensive 5:3:2 strategy.
UAE coach Bruno Metsu was forced to make some changes in the line up that featured in the opener. Salem Sa'ad started in attack replacing injured Faisal Khalil and Humaid Fakher played on the right side of defence replacing Fahad Masaoud.
Nawaf Mubarak played on midfied in place of Salem Khamis who was absent because of the sad passing away of his mother.
Ali Abbass replaced pivot Hilal Saeed, who was sent off in the opener.
The UAE started the match leading with a fast goal that came in the first minute when their captain Mohammad Omar converted a penalty awarded by referee Michel Lubos.
Following a corner kick from Nawaf Mubarak only 43 seconds into the game Yemen defender Mohammad Saleh handled the ball to conceded the penalty.
But the early goal did not appear to motivate the players as the play was limited to the midfield without any serious attacking moves.
The only one of note was when Omar passed to Sa'ad inside the penalty box and the latter's header struck the cross-bar, seven minutes before the interval.
It was evident that the UAE players were performing under tremendous pressures knowing that if they lost the match they will lose all chances to reach the semifinals.
Sa'ad and Adil Abdul Aziz had attempts which missed the target while Yemen had only one chance which was saved by Majid Nasir.
Play continued to be cautious and both teams were reluctant to attack. The UAE depended on long high balls to break through the solid Yemeni defence line.
But the visitors became more adventurous when they saw the UAE player's reluctance to attack and they moved up to exchange scoring attempts and that opened the way to their goal.
Metsu made his first substitution in the 63rd minute bringing in Subait Khater to replace Sa'ad and he earned a free-kick after being fouled.
Khater sent a high free kick to Basheer Saeed, the advancing libero, who headed home his team's second goal. Khalid Darwish came into the match in the 77th minute replacing Nawaf Mubarak.
Mohsin Saleh, the Yemeni coach, brought in Nasir Al Gazi in the 84th minute and it took him only three minutes to score his team's consolation goal, but that was all they could manage.
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