Abahani beat Maldives’ Club Eagles 2-1 yesterday at the Sylhet District Stadium in the Preliminary Stage-2 of the AFC Cup. Brazilian center-back Danilo Augusto scored the winning goal with a header in the last minute.
With the win, the six-time Bangladesh Premier League winners will play India’s Mohun Bagan on August 22 in a match for a spot in the tournament’s South Zone group stage.
We knew that bad weather would mess up the grass at the stadium, and it did make it hard for both teams to play their normal games.
But Abahani took advantage of the fact that this was something they had seen before, and on the muddy field, the home team, which had six foreign players, was ahead of the guests from the start.
The Sky Blues missed a few chances to score. Club Eagles goalie Mohamed Shafeeu stopped Uzbek player Muzaffar Muzaffarov twice, and both Grenadian forward Cornelius Stewart and Nigerian Ojuku David Ifegwu missed their chances in front of goal.
Cornelius finally made up for his mistake in the 21st minute when he headed in Ifegwu’s well-placed cross to give the Sky Blues the lead.
After the break, Club Eagles came back with a lot of determination and scored in the 61st minute, but it was called off-side. But it didn’t take long for the away team to tie the game. In the 63rd minute, captain Ahmed Rizuvan volleyed in a free kick by Milovan Petrovic.
Club Eagles put a lot of pressure on Abahani, and in the 81st minute, a goal hit their post and went back out.
Milad Soleimani, an Abahani defender, missed a close-range header a minute later, but the team’s disappointment went away when Augusto scored off a Muzaffarov corner in the 89th minute to seal a spot in the playoffs.