Lekhwiya players celebrate after defeating Umm Salal via a penalty shootout in their Emir Cup quarterfinal yesterday. Picture: Anas Khalid
By Sports Reporter/Doha
Lekhwiya survived the luck of the penalty shootout to defeat Umm Salal in the quarter-final of the Emir Cup held at the Abdullah bin Khalifa stadium yesterday. Umm Salal’s Fabio Cesar missed his chance while all the Lekhwiya players converted theirs to give the Qatar Stars League champions a 5-3 victory in the shootout.
Lekhwiya dominated possession yesterday, to the tune of 58 per cent at the end of the match but didn’t have too much to show for that. In fact, till the 80th minute the possession share was 67 per cent in favour of Lekhwiya. But they could only manage eight shots at the Salal goal with four on target.
Salal, on the other hand, despite not seeing as much of the ball as Lekhwiya, had 11 shots on goal with three on target. And it was Salal who had the more dangerous opportunities. They started the match well and were the team on the attack. Tuncay Sanli and Mohammed El-Sayed Abdulmutallab combined in the 10th minute but the Qatari striker’s shot ended up hitting the side netting.
Ten minutes later Sanli was involved in a 1-2 with Ahmed Fathi but the great cross was met with a misdirected header from the Turkish star. Sanli was left clutching is head after missing that chance.
Lekhiwya saw off that surge from Salal and were able to find their own rhythm but couldn’t create any chances that would have left anyone clutching their heads. Their best chance of the first half, and probably the match, came, right at the end of the first half when Luiz Junior fired in a powerful, flat free kick which required Salal keeper Baba Malik to pull off a diving save.
The second half saw Lekhwiya take more control of the ball while Salal were now content to absorb the pressure and attack on the counter. This meant more attacks for Lekhwiya. The 51st minute saw Vladimir Weiss shoot a low freekick, from the edge of the box, which was saved by Malik. But other than that it was Salal who were looking more threatening on the counter.
In the 59th minute Abdulmutallab, or Jeddo as he is known, got at the end of a great through pass but his shot was wide. It did go on to hit the cameraman seated there though. Then it was the turn of Sanli to miss another chance, this time in the 78th minute, when he his volley from inside the box went wide. Two minutes later Fathi, after creating the move by stealing the ball from a Lekhwiya defender, fired a wide shot from within the six-yard box.
This was the period in the match when Salal enjoyed a strong spell of possession but they would come to rue the missed chances in the end. The last action of regulation time was Weiss being booked for a clear dive inside the box. The Emir Cup rules state that the match will not have extra time but instead will head straight to penalties.
Sebastian Soria, who had come on as a substitute in the 73rd minute took the first shot for Lekhwiya and his shot hit Salal keeper Malik on the leg and went in. For Salal, it was Cesar who stepped up to take the first shot and it ended up being a feeble attempt, so wide of the goal that Lekhwiya keeper Ivanildo Rodrigues didn’t have to bother going for a save. Ahmed Abdel Maqsood, Tamir Jamal Othman, Ismail Mahmood all scored for Salal. While Chico Flores, Karim Boudiaf, Weiss and Youssef Msekni scored for Lekhwiya to emerge victorious.
Salal will feel that they could have gotten the better of Lekhwiya had they converted those chances. But in the end it was the QSL and Qatar Cup champions who stayed on course for a domestic treble.