JEDDAH, 27 January 2003 — Local challengers Al-Ittihad kept alive their chances of qualifying for the semifinals of the Arab League soccer competition for the Prince Faisal Cup after staging a second half fightback for a 3-1 victory over Kuwait’s Al-Qadisiyah at the Prince Abdullah Al-Faisal Stadium here last night.
In the Group One match, the hero for Ittihad was Abubakar Kamara who netted a superb hat trick. Ittihad were trailing 1-0 at the interval and put up a considerably improved display in the second half to emerge deserving victors.
With the loss, Qadisiyah are now out of the competition while Ittihad are second in the table with four points from two matches, the same as leaders Al-Malab of Tunisia who have a better goal difference.
Al-Malab were earlier held 1-1 by Olympic of Libya in the first match of the day.
After a goalless first half dominated by the Tunisians, Al-Malab scored soon after resumption through Anis Al-Ayyadi.
Abdussalam Khamis got the equalizer for the Libyans in the 59th minute as a defender tried to clear his shot and only managed to send the ball into his own goal.
Ittihad fell in arrears in the 26th minute when Hani Al-Saqar found the mark with a header in the left corner of the goal.
Kamara found the equalizer in the 48th minute when he centered from the left and a defender deflected the ball into his own goal. Four minutes later, a brilliant pass from Ittihad striker found Kamara face to face with the goalkeeper and he deftly placed the ball past him into the net.
It was Ittihad all the way after that and a bout of passes between Sergio and Kamara again found Kamara only the Kuwaiti goalkeeper to beat and he again made no mistake.
In today’s matches, Al-Fasi of Morocco will face Al-Ahli of Bahrain and Al-Ahli of Jeddah will meet Al-Afriqi of Tunisia.
