Al Ain to face Al-Hilal in Riyadh
The King Fahad International Stadium in the Saudi capital of Riyadh will host at 8 p.m. (Mecca time and 9 pm Abu Dhabi time) the Asian high caliber encounter when the UAE giants Al Ain faces Al Hilal of Saudi in the AFC Champions League Quarter-finals second-leg match.
Al Ain needs a victory or a non-clean sheet draw during the original time of the match to qualify, while the host side needs to win to clinch the qualifying card for the continental semi-finals.
In case of a goalless draw between the two teams during the original time, extra times will be played before the game score is decided from the penalty spot.
According to the tournament regulation and in the case of a tie, if a goal is scored by Al Ain in the two extra runs, it will not be equal to two goals, while it will be equal to two goals in the original time.
Croatian Zoran Mamić, the Head Coach of Al Ain, looks forward to achieving aspirations of Al-Ain fans to be on the top of the continent, especially as Mamic is the coach who has enjoyed the confidence of everyone including the club management, players and the fans.
Mamic also succeeded in discovering the distinctive talents of the Al Ain football academy and made them join the first teams, giving them the opportunity to defend the Al Ain colors. All of such youngsters confirmed that they are living up to the confidence of the coach.
One of Mamic’s most important strengths over his rivals is the good technical understanding of the match and the strong personality that he has gained from the possibilities of the club and the players, which enabled him to get the confidence of everyone and make him very close to the players of his squad.
As for the Al-Hilal Saudi Club, the Argentinian coach Ramon Diaz enjoys the confidence of all, especially after the outstanding figures achieved by his team during the first season of his reign, as he succeeded in clinching the title of the Saudi Professional League two rounds before its end, winning the Saudi cup title after defeating Al-Ahli in the final match and leading Al-Hilal to the quarter-finals of the Asian Championship.
In the last two training sessions, Diaz was keen on closing the training doors for fans with the aim of focusing on the tactics that he will face Al-Ain with in tonight’s match.
In the training of the day before yesterday, the Saudi giants’ fans were allowed to enter within the first fifteen minutes before they were asked to leave the Al Hilal stadium under the pretext of the “team interest”.
The “Bosses” Encounter
Al-Ain and Al-Hilal faced each other in the AFC Champions League under the new name eight times since 2003, Al Ain won four matches while Al Hilal won three times, and there was a goalless tie in one match which was the first leg of the 2017 Champions League.
Eighteen goals were scored in Al Ain and Al Hilal matches, 9 for each team. The top scorer of Al Ain and Al Hilal matches is former player of Al-Hilal and Al-Ain, Nasser Al Shamrani with three goals in Al-Ain net in 2014 in the home and away matches of the AFC semifinals.
Al-Ain team won the AFC Champions League title once under the new name “2003” while Al-Hilal did not win the continental title under the new name, but they were the runners-up once in 2014. As for Al-Ain, they were runners-up three times, most recently in the last season.
Absences
In tonight’s match, Al Ain will be missing the efforts of two defenders, Mohanad Al Enezi and Khaled Abdulrahman, as they suspended, after the first was sent off by a red card and the second received a second yellow card.
Al-Ain “the Boss” is regaining the efforts of his strong defender Ismail Ahmed. It is expected that Al-Hilal will regain the efforts of midfielders Nawaf Al-Abed and Nicolas Milesi, while the suspended trio, Salman Al-Faraj, Abdullah Otaif and Abdullah Al-Hafiz, will be absent from the team lineup along with Yasser Al-Qahtani and Mohammed Al- Breik due to injury.
High-profile reception
The mission of the Al Ain team arrived in Saudi Arabia yesterday evening on a private plane. The mission was received, at the terminal of King Khalid International Airport, by members of the UAE Embassy in Saudi under Ahmed Al-Taniji, the Charge d’affaires and Rachid Ahmed Rumaithi, the second secretary of the embassy as well as public relations officials of Al Hilal Saudi Club.
