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Al Hammadi save the day for Al Ahli with a 2-2 draw

 

With a last minute goal, Ismail Al Hammadi saved the day for his team Al Ahli when he scored the equalizer in the dying moments to end the game played tonight at Rashid Stadium against Kalba with a 2-2 draw in the first match of round 14 of the Etisalat Pro-League Competition. The hosts raised their tally to 22 points to stay provisionally in third place while Kalba are still at the bottom of the table with 8 points.

 Al Ahli were the better side in the opening minutes of the game. They made some good attempts through Faisal Khalil, Ismail Al Hammadi and Ahmed Khamis, but all their attacks were weak to the extent that their rivals' defenders found no difficulty to spoil them with great confidence. Most of play was concentrated at the midfield zone for almost twenty minutes. But the visitors started to recover afterwards with their French midfielder Gregory exerting big efforts, creating a number of raids, making lovely and perfect passes to his teammates who failed to find the target. Gregory came close to put his team into the lead with a perfect header capitalizing off the ball switched by Brazilian player Elyas Di Olivera only 23 minutes into the game, but the hosts' goalkeeper Yousuf Abdullah deflected the ball to a corner. It was the first dangerous attempt since the start of the match

Al Ahli played without of a number of their key players among whom were the striker Ahmad Khalil, Mohammad Jasim, Abdullah Trawri and Obaid Khalifa. In spite of this shortage, Al Ahli looked the most dangerous side. Their fronliner Faisal Khalil came close to find the back of the net when he collected the ball, passed the custodian. He sent the ball towards the empty net for Rashid Malalla to clear it only centimeters before it crosses the goal line six minutes before the break.

 Brazilian striker Pinga squandered another sitter five minutes later. But Karim Al Ahmadi of Al Ahli, compensated for the two lost opportunities when he headed the ball home which was switched by Ahmad Khamis from the right flank in the last minute to end the first session with a 1-0 lead for the home team.

Kalba recovered after the break to produce convincing display. They leveled the game in the 57th minute through Mohammad Malalla. Both squads started   to look for the second goal with Faisal Khalil losing a valuable chance in the 67th minute.

The visitors pressed hard in the last minutes and their hard work was paid dividends when their Brazilian player Elyas Di Olivera netted the second goal with a nice header four minutes from the final whistle giving his team a 2-1 lead. But Ismail Al Hammadi deprived Kalba from a deserved victory when he leveled the score in the last minute to end the game with a 2-2 draw.