Al Shaab shock Al Wasl - Hamed and farhad Played

Gulf News - Al Shaab blanked Al Wasl 3-0 in a dazzling performance at the Al Wasl stadium in Zaabil in the First division football league last night.

With this win, Al Shaab leapfrogged to the second place with 25 points. They are one adrift of leaders Al Wahda, who have 26 points. The heavy defeat left Al Wasl, who have 12 points, in the relegation zone. And they will have to work hard in the coming matches. Al Wasl played with 10 men after defender Sami Rabie was sent off for  a harsh foul on Jasim Doukhy in the 55th minute.

Al Wasl were the best team in the first 15 minutes. They attacked but without real danger to the Al Shaab goal.

Al Shaab attacks were dangerous whenever the ball came to Mohammed Suroor or Samir Ibrahim at the front.

Samir opened the score for Al Shaab in the 19th minute. Ali Abdullah crossed to him from the left and Samir's header beat Al Wasl custodian Salah Hussain to his left. Salah miscalculated Samir's header and thought the ball was going out.

Al Wasl attacks were led by Khalid Darwish in the midfield to his frontliners Iranian Farhad Majiedi and his countryman Hamid Kavianpour, who returned to the team again thanks to the poor standard of Argentinian player Walter Silvani. Silvani's contract was terminated last week.

The Al Wasl attacks were blocked all the time by the strong Al Shaab defence led by Rashid Abdul Rahman, Omran Jessmy and Saeed Yousuf.

In the 34th minute Al Wasl midfielder Jasim Bilal realising that his attackers couldn't go past Al Shaab defence, fired a cracker from outside the penalty area. The shot bounced off the bar and Al Shaab keeper diverted the ball to the corner.

After three minutes Kavianpour advanced to face the keeper. But his shot was tipped to the corner by Shaab keeper Jamal Abdullah.

Suroor added the second goal for Al Shaab in the 42nd minute with a fine header following a free kick taken by Jasim Doukhy from the left flank.

Issa Ali lost a good chance to reduce the defecit for Al Wasl when he shot straight to the keeper's hands from close range after two minutes of resumption.

Al Shaab defended well and kept Al Wasl strikers at bay most of the second session. Al Wasl midfielders and attackers committed lot of mistakes in passing to each other. Al Shaab took advantage of this and launched several quick attacks by Jasim Doukhy, Abdul Rahim Choclate, Saif Mohammed and Suroor.

Al Wasl coach took out two of his good playmakers Kavianpour and Khalid Darwish, which didn't satisfy the supporters. Al Was coach also made Farhad come down to the midfield to collect the balls and create attacks. Suroor and Saif lost two scoring chances in the last minutes. However Suroor sealed victory for Al Shaab when he scored the third goal from the spot. Al Wasl keeper brought him down inside the box and Suroor made no mistake in converting the spot kick to the left of Salah Hussain.

In the second match Sharjah played a goalless draw with Al Ittihad in Kalba stadium. Ittihad become seventh with 13 points and Sharjah stayed 10th with 11.