I Want Umm Salal Cup reserves its seat in the final by defeating Al Arabi with two goals to one

The Umm Salal team reached the final match of the Irid Cup Football Championship by defeating its Arab counterpart with two goals to one, in the confrontation that brought them together today at Jassim bin Hamad Stadium in the semi-final round of the competition.

Al-Arabi opened the scoring through striker Ibrahim Nasser Kalla in the 33rd minute, and Adel Abdullah Khafifi equalized for Umm Salal in the 87th minute, before Jordanian striker Yassin Al-Bakhit succeeded in breaking the tie and scoring the second goal in the sixth minute of stoppage time. The team of Moroccan coach Talal Al-Karkouri, who managed to overturn the delay with a goal to an exciting victory in stoppage time, set a date in the final match on March 28th with Al-Duhail, who in turn beat Al-Sadd by 3-1. The start came quickly from both sides in their quest to score an early goal, and Al-Arabi relied on penetrations from depth and resorting to high balls. On the other hand, Umm Salal appeared at a good level and was able to close its back positions and threaten Al-Arabi’s goal with opportunities to score, but the vigilance of the latter’s defense prevented him from scoring. Al-Arabi, who was absent from the Syrian forward line duo Omar Al-Soma and Tunisian Youssef Al-Masakni, got the precedence in the 33rd minute by his attacker Ibrahim Nasser Kalla, who took advantage of the pass he received from his colleague Abdullah Al-Muraisi inside the penalty area after a typical attack to put the ball to the left of the Umm Salal goalkeeper. The result did not change in the remaining minutes, which witnessed some attempts from Umm Salal, but it missed the final touch, so Al-Arabi went out to the break ahead with a clean goal. In the second half, it was clear that Umm Salal had a great desire to adjust the balance and was able to intensify his attacks on the opponent’s goal, relying on the Portuguese Joao Teixeira, the Brazilian Vinicius Orakho and the Jordanian Yassin Al Bakhit. On the other hand, Al-Arabi wanted to maintain his balance in the back lines and rebound with some attacks, and was able to impose his style on the midfield. Hamed Ismail tried to enter from the right side and played a reverse ball, but it did not find follow-up inside the Umm Salal penalty area in the 53rd minute. Al-Arabi coach Younis Ali was forced to make an emergency change after the team captain Abdullah Marafieh was injured, to replace Ahmed Fathi to strengthen the back lines. With the 55th minute, Umm Salal pressured and he was almost able to adjust the score by his Brazilian striker Vinicius Oraujo from an opportunity in front of the goal, but Al-Arabi goalkeeper Jassem Al-Hail kept his net clean, and Al-Hail returned to turn the header that the Brazilian Oraujo played inside the area into a corner. Three minutes before the end of the regular time, Umm Salal translated his preference in the last 10 minutes by adjusting the score by his defender Abdullah Khafifi, who took advantage of a ball inside the area and aimed to the left of Al-Arabi goalkeeper Jassem Al-Hail. And in the sixth minute of stoppage time, Jordanian Yassin Al-Bakhit managed to add the second goal for Umm Salal, after he took advantage of his colleague Atef Muhammad’s pass inside the penalty area and sent a powerful ball, which Al-Arabi goalkeeper Jassem Al-Hail failed to return, so that Al-Bakhit led his team to the final match. Al-Arabi qualified for the semi-finals after leading the second group with 10 points from three wins, a draw and one defeat. While Umm Salal secured access to the semi-finals after leading the first group with 13 points from four wins and a draw without defeat.