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Al Wahda raise tally to 24 points with three straight goals win over Dubai

Abu Dhabi- based and seventh-placed Al Wahda raised their tally to 24 points after beating Dubai with three straight goals in the Etisalat Pro League round 17 match at the losers’ home ground. But despite of this deserved victory, the winners remain in their 7th previous position, five points ahead of their rivals who sit in 8th place on 19 points but have to wait and see the outcome of Al Wasl vs. Kalba which due to kick off at 8:18pm this evening.

The visiting team dominated the game from the word go and were able to take the lead only four minutes into play through their first choice player Ismail Mattar who fired a strong volley that deflected by a defender into the net. Inspired by this early goal, Al Wahda doubled their efforts and fought hard looking for the second goal but they failed to find the target.

On the other hand, the hosts did not give up but they went on their attempts trying to recover and come back to the match, but Al Wahda’s defense who missed the efforts of defender Hamdan Al Kamaly, gave them no room to threaten their keeper Adil Al Hosani. The Brazilian striker Marcelinho was almost to add the second goal in the 26th minute but his shot was saved brilliantly by the goalkeeper Jamal Abdullah before being cleared away by a defender. Baba Waigo made it 2-0 two minutes later capitalizing on Ismail Matter’s switched ball in front of the goal mouth off a stand ball. The same player came to squander a lovely chance six minutes before the break when his volley was deflected by Dubai’s custodian to a corner and Vergilio of Dubai lost a close-range chance two minutes later to end the first session with a 2-0 win for Al Wahda.

Three minutes into the second half, Dubai made two successive attempts when Richard Porta sent a strong shot that went over the cross bar and Hassan Abdurrahman’s second volley was controlled by the goalkeeper Adil Al Hosani. Al Wahda continued tightening their grib on the encounter whilst Dubai tried every bit of effort to reduce the deficit and come back into the match, but Papa Waigo put the game beyond reach scoring the third goal in the 63rd minute. The two sides went on their attempts in the remaining time but failed to score more goals.