AL WAHDA 1 AL NASR 0
Al Wahda - Tagliabue 7'
ABU DHABI // Sebastian Tagliabue’s early strike was enough for Al Wahda to emerge 1-0 winners over Al Nasr and move to fourth spot in the Arabian Gulf League.
Sultan Al Ghafri ran through a couple of defenders before slipping it to the Argentine striker, who finished it off with his deft right foot on Friday night at the Al Nahyan stadium.
The closest Nasr came to a score was a Jires Kembo-Ekoko effort that crashed against the post off a counter attack in the first half.
The visitors also ended the game with 10 men when Khalifa Mubarak was given his marching orders for an off-the-ball skirmish with the Wahda centre-back Hamdan Al Kamali.
The result took Wahda’s tally to 29 points, three behind third-placed Nasr.
Javier Aguirre, the Wahda coach, said they could have scored more from the many scoring chances they created in the first half.
“We played a good first half. We applied a lot of pressure on them and deserved to score more than a goal in this period,” the Mexican said.
“Nasr came back strongly in the next period and some of our players got tired.
“So Ismail Matar and Mohammed Al Akberi had to drop down in defence most of the time. Then I told them to preserve their energy and they did well to preserve the lead.
“Tagliabue is doing well and scoring in every match. He has struck a good partnership with [Jorge] Vadivia.”
Ivan Jovanovic, Al Nasr coach, said they lost control of the game after an early goal in the first half. “We made a lot of mistakes during this period and couldn’t create many scoring chances,” he said.
“Obviously, we are disappointed with the result but we must also understand we cannot play below par and expect to win against teams like Wahda.
“We played better in the second half but again we couldn’t create more scoring chances.”
* Amith Passela
DIBBA 0 AL AIN 1
Al Ain - Ismail 89'
The league leaders left it late to pick up the three points at Dibba yesterday.
Ismail Ahmed netted in the 89th minute to give Al Ain the victory, which moves them five points clear at the top of the table for at least 24 hours, with nearest challengers Al Ahli in action at Sharjah tonight.
AL DHAFRA 2 FUJAIRAH 1
Al Dhafra - Y Abdulrahman 34', Diop 88'
Fujairah - Eze 47'
A goal two minutes from time from Makhete Diop boosted Dhafra’s hopes of avoiding relegation.
The second-bottom side in the AGL had looked set to be held to a draw until Diop netted.
Dhafra, who are now only one point adrift of safety had taken the lead through Abdulrahman Yousuf, but Patrick Eze had cancelled this out for the visitors two minutes into the second half.
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