10-man Lekhwiya hold out for a win against Gharafa, Salal thump Shamal 5-0

By Sports Reporter/DohaLekhwiya survived a late fight back from Al Gharafa and a red card to their striker Sebastian Soria to win their Qatar Stars League encounter 3-2 at the Thani bin Jassim stadium yesterday.Lekhwiya had many players away on international duty during the midseason break and head coach Michael Laudrup remarked that it was only on the eve of the match that the entire squad had reunited and trained together.But it was Laudrup’s boys who dominated the match right from the start. Soria opened the scoring for the team early in the 15th minute and then doubled his team’s advantage in the 35th minute. Lekhwiya looked comfortable going into the break with a 2-0 scoreline. And further established their dominance when striker Ismail Mohamad scored in the 50th minute to give his team a 3-0 lead.But then Gharafa clawed one back in the 61st minute through Mustafa Abdulla. And that’s when the fight back began. Gharafa were steadily building in confidence and were mounting constant attacks. Lekhwiya players were getting rattled by it and the frustration surfaced when Soria got a red card in the 76th minute.But despite that surge in momentum and having the advantage of an extra man, Gharafa could only find one more goal late into injury time when Lekhwiya’s Ahmed Aziz scored an own goal in the 91st minute. That made the score 3-2. The Red Knights however overcame the late scare as they held on for the win.Lekhwiya will be happy that with this win since they have created a gap of two points between them and Al Sadd, who could only manage a draw in their match against Al Wakrah yesterday (2-2). SALAL EMBARRASS SHAMALIn the other match, Umm Salal produced a strong performance for a thumping 5-0 victory over Al Shamal in their Qatar Stars League encounter held yesterday at the Suhaim bin Hamad stadium.Salal players ensured that they took control of the match early on itself. In the 23rd minute Tuncay Sanli found the breakthrough to give his team the lead. Pejman Mohammadreza then doubled Salal’s lead in the 35th minute and with each passing minute, it looked like Shamal players couldn’t muster any sort of response to the superior offence of their opponents. The second half saw the script being repeated and Shamal defence remained as porous as before. Salal’s Ismail Mahmoud took advantage of the shaky defence and scored twice in the second half – in the 53rd and then in the 66th minute.  Salal’s Jeremie Aliadiere, who came on as a substitute in the 69th minute, wrapped up the humiliation for Shamal by scoring in the 87th minute. Salal had 55 per cent of possession but mainly such was their dominance that they had managed to deny Shamal even a single shot on target.  Salal are one of the teams who are looking to finish in the top 4 and they have had a decent run of results under coach Bulent Uygun. Shamal, on the other hand, have failed to win a single match so far. And have even brought in new coach Dragan Cvetkovi?, having sacked Silvio Diliberto who had helped the team gain promotion into the QSL this season. But as is clear from this match, Shamal needs a lot of work to be done if they are to survive relegation this season.Salal will be happy with their  performance which sees them in fifth place in the table currently. They are just one point behind Qatar SC in the rankings and will be hoping that they can put in a string of good results in this second half of the season and produce a top 4 finish.