JEDDAH: The Saudi national team failed to cash in opportunities and, as a result, surrendered two valuable points against Iran in the first match in the final stage of the 2010 Asian World Cup qualifiers last Saturday.
The match could have easily ended in a resounding home victory for Saudi Arabia. Instead the 1-1 draw at the King Fahd International Stadium in Riyadh left the sides sharing the points in Group B.
Also, the draw puts the Kingdom under pressure to win its next match tomorrow against a UAE side seeking to bounce back from its 2-1 defeat against North Korea.
The Saudis had been in control after taking an early lead but gaps in defense allowed the Iranian team to score the equalizer at crunch time.
To underline the Saudi team’s poor finishing the hosts were unable to convert their shots on goal, which were plentiful. Iran apart from finding the equalizer came dangerously close to scoring the winner in the highly charged match.
For Iran, gaining the away draw is an advantage should it figure in a tie with Saudi Arabia for one of two automatic World Cup berths from the group.
Khaled Al-Shunaif, former national team player and Ahli player, said the Saudi coach had stuck to the same formation he used during the warmup matches. “It was a smart move to introduce Hussein Abdul Ghani who is an experienced player, which added more confidance and harmony between the players. The Saudi team managed to threaten the Iranian team more than once and through the new player, Faisal Al-Sultan, who gave Iranian defenders a lot of headache. Though Al-Sultan lacked the finishing touch inside the penalty box due to his lack of experience he managed to team up well with Al-Harithi in the striking line,” he said.
Former national team and Nasr striker and captain, Majed Abdullah, said the Saudi team did not benefit from the warmup matches. Those matches were not analyzed properly and it showed in the official matches, he said.
“We consider this a loss to lose two points on our soil,” said Abdullah. He added, “The match was ours and our players began losing control and switching to a defensive game in the second half giving a perfect opportunity for the Iranian team to pressure and score the equalizer. The Iranian coach introduced two strikers in the second half at the expense of a midfielder and a striker. This confused the Saudi coach who introduced Omar Al-Ghamdi and took Al-Shalhoub out.
Al-Shalhoub was effective and losing him stemmed the tide of the match in favor of the Iranian team.”
Yousuf Khamees, former Nasr player and football analyst, said, “There are many elements that lead to this result. The first one was the penalty kick the referee did not call in the 22nd minute. Should that penalty awarded and scored by the Saudi team, it would have killed the Iranian attempts and played in favor of the Saudi team. The other one was when Khaled Al-Sultan and Muhammad Al-Shalhoub were replaced. Their performance was convincing and they should have stayed. The Saudi team lost their energy in the last 20 minutes and this gave the Iranian team the fillip to gamble with an attacking game.”
