Thu, 28 Oct, 2021
Beirut: Inspirational captain Roda Antar returned from injury to score the crucial goal as Lebanon recorded a famous 1-0 win over Iran on Tuesday which kept alive their hopes of qualifying for the 2014 FIFA World Cup finals.
Antar, who had missed his team's first three matches in Group A because of a knee injury, headed in a free-kick by Mohamad Haidar after 28 minutes to give the Cedars all three points at Sports City Stadium.
The Iranians dominated possession but struggled to carve out any clear openings until the very end when Lebanon goalkeeper Abbas Hassan made a series of outstanding saves to preserve the victory.
The win was Lebanon's first ever against Team Melli, who had won six of the previous seven international meetings between the two sides. More importantly, it put Theo Bucker's side right back into contention for a spot in the 2014 FIFA World Cup after they had managed only one point from their first three matches in the group.
They now have four points from four games, level with second-placed Iran and Qatar and three points behind group leaders Korea Republic, who drew 2-2 with Uzbekistan in an earlier match.
"We had a good performance today and I'm happy with what the players showed in the game," said Lebanon coach Bucker. "We showed that we are capable of getting good results and now we have a good chance after this win to qualify although we must work hard.
"We played against a strong team but we believed that we could win and that helped us tonight. We now have to get some rest and prepare well for our next game against Qatar."
While the Iranians enjoyed the lion's share of possession, they did very little to trouble the home side, who were quite content to sit back and hit their opponents on the counter-attack.
And against the run of play, they took the lead just before the half-hour mark when Haidar floated in a free-kick from the right that picked out Antar on the edge of the six-yard box and the Lebanon captain expertly guided his header past goalkeeper Seyed Rahmati and into the net despite Pejman Nouri's desperate attempt to clear the ball off the line.
With the lead in hand, the home side seemed prepared to shut down the game and continually frustrated their opponents by denying them space and holding up the ball while they were in possession.
A frustrated Carlos Queiroz sent on Ehsan Haji Safi and Mohammad Ghazi to replace Karim Ansari and Nouri at half-time but the visitors continued to struggle with Mohammed Noori's header, which forced a sharp save from Abbas Hassan just before the hour, their only real chance early in the second half.
But Hassan would become more influential as the game entered its closing stage as he denied Javad Nekounam twice in a minute after turning aside a powerful volley from just inside the box and then diving low to keep out the Iran captain's header from the resulting corner.
The Lebanon goalkeeper then made another brilliant save in stoppage time to deny Ghazi as the fans at the Sports City Stadium celebrated one of the most memorable results in their country's football history.
Iran coach Queiroz felt that Abbas' performance was the crucial difference between the two sides.
"Congratulations to Lebanon who won with the least possible effort," said the Portuguese. "We had a good match and had a great performance but Lebanon had a good goalkeeper who had a great game and denied us a lot of times.
"Despite the defeat, we are still in the competition although the situation is now complicated. We missed several players today and Lebanon showed good fighting spirit which coupled with a good performance of their goalkeeper helped them to win."