Tue, 30 Nov, -0001
Abu Dhabi: United Arab Emirates qualified for a fourth consecutive AFC Asian Cup on Friday as the Gulf Cup champions maintained their 100% record in Group D following a comprehensive 4-0 win over Hong Kong on Friday.
Salem Al Rejaibi and Walid Abbas scored in the first half at Mohammed Bin Zayed Stadium, and with Omar Abdulrahman and Ismail Al Hammadi adding late goals, the UAE joined Bahrain and Saudi Arabia in sealing their passage through the qualifiers with two games remaining.
The visitors, meanwhile, slipped three points behind second place Uzbekistan who will make the trip to Hong Kong next week in the penultimate round of fixtures after the Central Asians earlier beat Vietnam 3-0 in Hanoi.
“We are happy to have qualified for to the Asian Cup finals and we have 24 players who all contributed and helped us to reach this far,” said UAE coach Mahdi Ali.
“The match was good from our side and we now have a good image and everyone knows that we are now a good team and that is why our opponents usually play with a defensive formation and we knew that we will face such tactics.
“We had many options to break the defence of Hong Kong as we used the flanks and had long distance shots while our players played well in front of the goal and against our opponents. The players successfully managed to score from their chances.”
Having beaten Hong Kong 4-0 last month, the UAE dominated from the first whistle with the visitors’ goal coming under significant pressure, and goalkeeper Yapp Hung Fai was forced into a flying save after 20 minutes to push Habib Al Fardan’s free-kick from the edge of the penalty area around the post.
And the home side broke the deadlock with a stylish opener 13 minutes before half-time as the impressive Abdulrahman played a slide rule pass into the onrushing Ismaeil Matar and the UAE captain squared the ball across the face of goal for Al Rejaibi to complete the finish with Yapp drawn out of position at his near post.
The UAE’s control over the contest continued and the home side doubled their advantage five minutes before half-time as Abbas dispatched a superb angled volley into the bottom corner from inside the penalty area.
Hong Kong remained on the backfoot at the start of the second half, and with the outstanding Abdulrahman at his unplayable best for the home side, Yapp had to be quick off his line to block at the feet on the onrushing Matar.
The UAE should have added a third five minutes after the hour mark as Abdulrahman’s exquisite ball into the area found Abbas but the defender failed to guide his header on target.
But with 10 minutes remaining Abdulrahman claimed the goal his performance deserved as the midfielder beat Yapp from just inside the area with what proved to be his last touch of the game.
And seven minutes later the home side sealed the win courtesy of Al Hammadi’s near post glancing header as the UAE qualified for the finals alongside hosts Australia, defending champion Japan, Korea Republic, 2012 AFC Challenge Cup winners DPR Korea and Bahrain.
“I want to congratulate the UAE for their victory as they were the better side and they have good capabilities. Despite the defeat, we will not give up and we will try to maintain our chances of qualifying,” said Hong Kong coach Kim Pan-gon.
“In football there is victory and defeat and we took advantage of the game and we must try our best to fix the mistakes that we had in the next training sessions if we want to have good results in the last two matches.
“Again congratulations to the UAE and I hope that we can get good points in order to achieve our target and finish second in the group.”