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Al Wahda 4-0 Emirates: Karel Jarolim’s men cruise to comfortable win

Al Wahda cruised to a 4-0 victory over Emirates thanks to three goals in the opening eight minutes of the Round 3 Arabian Gulf League match at the Al Nahyan Stadium on Saturday night. Sebastian Tagliabue, Ismaeil Matar and Eisa Ahmed were all on target early on in the game before Tagliabue added his second and Al Wahda’s fourth in the second half.

The game began with eight minutes of madness as Al Wahda stormed into an early 3-0 lead. In just the third minute, a throw-in by Mahmoud Khamis on the left was touched back to him by Abdulla Saeed for Khamis to whip an angled cross into the area, where Argentine striker Sebastian Tagilabue had anticipated well to finish from close range at the near post. A minute later it was 2-0 to the hosts as the Emirates defense failed to deal with Hamdan Al Kamali’s long ball, allowing Ismaeil Matar to coolly stroke a left-footed finish into the net. And by the 8th minute it was 3-0 as Al Wahda took a short corner on the right for Mahmoud Khamis to curl a cross into the area, finding Eisa Ahmed to tap home past Emirates goalkeeper Abdulla Moosa.

Al Wahda didn’t rest on their laurels in the second half, extending their lead further in the 63rd minute as Ismaeil Matar set up Sebastian Tagliabue for a simple tap-in to make it 4-0 with his second goal of the game. The task of a possible turnaround became even tougher for Emirates as they were reduced to 10 men in the 66th minute, with Rodrigo Souza picking up his second booking of the game. With Al Wahda in a comfortable lead and Emirates with little hope of making a comeback, the remainder of the game petered out and Al Wahda strolled to a comfortable 4-0 victory, with Jair squandering Emirates’ best chance of a consolation goal in injury time by shooting over the crossbar.