Fair and square victory for UAE over Dutch, Brazil

Dubai: Discipline is often overlooked in football, but good discipline can sometimes be rewarding as the UAE U-17 squad found out yesterday when it was handed a life-line by organisers of the ongoing FIFA U-17 World Cup tournament in Nigeria.

Following their 1-0 loss to the US, the Emiratis should have been on their way home, but they shrugged off Brazil and The Netherlands as one of the best third-place finishers to make the knockout Round of 16 courtesy of their better Fair-Play ranking after all other criteria were equal.

The Dutch, Brazilians and Emiratis all finished with three points and had the same goal difference. The trio had even scored the same number of goals, but the Emiratis reached the knockout stage for the first time on the virtue of one less caution in the Fair-Play countback.

UAE head coach Ali Ibrahim wasn’t available for a comment but on the eve of the side’s Round of 16 match with Group D winners Turkey, his assistant Salim Al Arfi, said: “What can I say about having qualified, except that we're over the moon. We've got a great team, but today we lost out to the USA, who are another great team. But that doesn't matter now, we're just happy to be through to the last 16, where I think we can continue to spring surprises.”

If the UAE beat Turkey and secure a spot in the quarter-finals of the tournament, it will be the second time an Emirati youth side achieves the feat in as many months after the nation’s U-20 heroes made it to the finals of the FIFA U-20 competition in Egypt in October, where they lost 2-1 to Costa Rica in the dying moments of a nail-biting last eight encounter.