Thu, 28 Oct, 2021
Al Rakha: Saudi Arabia and Yemen made positive starts to their AFC U-19 Championship qualifying campaigns on Friday, with the Group B hosts scoring four second-half goals to run out comfortable 5-0 winners over Turkmenistan while Yemen had a much tougher time in their opening fixture as they edged Syria 1-0.
Saudi midfielder Ammar Al Najjar opened the scoring with quarter-of-an-hour at the Prince Saud bin Jalawi Stadium played with what transpired to be the only goal of the first half.
Trailing by just a single goal, the Central Asians were far from out of the contest but their hopes of taking something out of the game were given a terminal blow just three minutes into the second half when forward Kerim Ovezov was sent off after picking up his second yellow card of the game having already been cautioned by UAE referee Mohamed Abdelkarim Al Zarooni in the 29th minute.
The Saudis made the most of their extra-man advantage with Ayman Al Khulaif (63rd), skipper Meshari Al Kahtani (70th), and Abdulrahman Al Yami (82nd, 90th+3) all getting on the scoresheet as the hosts went top the table on goal difference ahead of Yemen, who defeated Syria 1-0 in the opening Group B fixture earlier at the same venue, with a tight contest settled in the 77th minute by defender Abdulhakim Ahmed.
Yemen will look to build on their opening win when they take on Turkmenistan on Sunday, with hosts Saudi Arabia also looking to put themselves in a strong position to reach next year’s continental finals across the King Fahd Causeway when they face Syria on the same day.
Ten group winners and five best second-placed teams will qualify for the finals while hosts Bahrain received an automatic qualification (total 16 teams).
If Bahrain finish top of their qualifying group or one of the five second best-placed teams, the next (6th) second-placed team will qualify for the final competition.