Al-Ain Qualified for 2018 Club World Cup Final Round

DBasia.news – Despite the status as the invited team, Al-Ain surprisingly went to the final round of 2018 Club World Cup.

The semifinal round between Al-Ain against River Plate could force them to the penalty shootout round.

During the normal time, Al-Ain dominated the match at 3′ by the goal from Markus Berg. River responded by the goals in five minutes with the brace from Rafael Borre at 11′ and 16′. The 2-1 score persisted until the break.

On the second half, Al-Ain searched for the chance to equalize the score. Luckily, Caio Fernandes scored the goal at 51′ and forced River to play the additional time. After no more goal for 120 minutes, the final option would be the penalty shootout.

All Al-Ain penalty executors successfully do their job. But on the other hand, Enzo Perez failed to score the fifth penalty kick and brought Al-Ain to the final round for the first time.

“It wasn’t easy for us to reach the final. In the opener we played for 120 minutes, then we had a big game against Esperance. And this was the third match in a very short space of time. Despite this, our players performed extremely well in all three games, which is not easy to do,” said Al-Ain defender Ismael Ahmed.