Al Ain boss Nasaf at HBZ P39

Al Ain - Dalic's side in last 16 of the AFC Champions League

Al Ain gave coach Zlatko Dalic the right kind of tonic by making it to the next stage of the AFC Champions League from the group qualifying phase, late Tuesday night.
Playing at home, The Boss dictated terms from the kickoff and except for the few attempts at the goal by the Uzbek club Nasaf, the match belonged totally to Al Ain who stormed to a deserving 2-0 group win.
Al Ain coach Zlatko Dalic said: "I congratulate the players for this victory and for qualifying to the next round. The players showed great determination to get the three points and they followed the plan we put in place before the match."
"We played with an offensive performance in the first half and controlled proceedings. We were the better side as we took the lead and created several scoring chances and although we missed a lot we eventually scored the second goal in the last minute," the official AFC website quoted Dalic.
Nasaf coach Ruziqul Berdiev said: "Al Ain are one of the best sides in the continent and they deserved to win tonight. We didn't play well in the first half as we played with a defensive plan and this affected us. We wanted to avoid conceding goals in the first half and we relied on counter attacks. However, we didn't achieve our target as Al Ain were too good today and we missed several scoring chances as well."
Needing all three points to be sure of remaining in the competition, Al Ain exerted pressure with Dyanfres Douglas and Omar Abdulrahman orchestrating inroads into the Nasaf territory.
Danillo Asprilla and Ismail Ahmed found the target in the 39th and 90th minutes to propel The Boss into the next phase of the continent's premier tournament as the runners-up in Group D behind El Jaish (Qatar). 
It was superstar Omar's turn to trouble the Uzbeks in the 25th minute with a brilliant curler that tested keeper Eldorbek Suyunov to the full, as the goaltender somehow gathered the ball after it bounced back into play from the far right post. Al Ain took the lead 14 minutes later as the ever reliable Omar spoon fed Asprilla with a perfect through ball, and the latter outpaced the Nasaf defence before firing a low, right-foot shot under Suyunov (1-0).
Fellipe Bastos came close to increasing the lead for the hosts twice in the next 10 minutes with superbly executed long range shots which the overworked Suyunov just about managed to keep away.
Douglas and Mohammad Abdulrahman combined well in the second half and in a rare counter offensive, Bobir Abdixolikov of Nasaf rocketed a fantastic half volley in the 76th minute, only to see the effort come back off the cross piece.
Nasaf's efforts to remain in the Championship vanished completely when Ahmed's header in the 90th minute off Omar's corner sealed the issue in favour of The Boss.

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