{"id":10998,"date":"2010-02-23T20:02:34","date_gmt":"2010-02-24T04:02:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/2010\/02\/23\/majidi-brace-downs-al-ahli-in-acl\/"},"modified":"2013-02-01T23:48:22","modified_gmt":"2013-02-02T07:48:22","slug":"majidi-brace-downs-al-ahli-in-acl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/2010\/02\/23\/majidi-brace-downs-al-ahli-in-acl\/","title":{"rendered":"Majidi brace downs Al Ahli in ACL [VIDEO]"},"content":{"rendered":"

PFDC – JEDDAH, A brace from veteran striker Farhad Majidi handed Esteghlal Tehran a sweet 2-1 victory over Saudi Arabia’s Al Ahli in Jeddah in the two teams’ opening match of the 2010 AFC Champions League on Tuesday evening.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The 32-year-old former Rapid Vienna man shocked the hosts early in the game, when his header to a Fabio Januario cross beat the goalkeeper, just 12 minutes into the game.<\/p>\n

Esteghlal pulled back after taking the lead and only defended against extremely dominant hosts who, however, failed to capitalize on any of their numerous good scoring chances.<\/p>\n

The Iranians almost were rewarded for their ultra-defensive approach when shortly before halftime Khosro Heydari inscened Majidi, who perfectly dribbled past the last defender, however, failed to double the lead with only the keeper to beat.<\/p>\n

Al Ahli continued to outplay Esteghlal in second half and the Blues were very lucky not to concede an equalizer, especially when the homeside failed to convert a rightfully awarded penalty kick. Mohammad Mohammadi, who replaced Vahid Talebloo today, had fouled sizzling winger Jizawi, but also saved Marcinho’s spotkick.<\/p>\n

On the other side, Majidi missed another so called 100%er after a counter attack. Once again the nimble striker had gotten everything but the finishing touch right.<\/p>\n

But 14 minutes from time the Esteghlal skipper showed why he had been recalled to the national team recently, when headed a pinpoint-cross from Heydari into the net to make it 2-0.<\/p>\n

Majidi actually put the win beyond doubt shortly later, however, his third goal of the day was ruled offside, a clearly wrong decision.<\/p>\n

The false call almost cost Esteghlal dearly, who finally conceded the very much overdue first goal, four minutes before the final whistle. After a good combination, Raheb headed a cross from the right past Mohammadi.<\/p>\n

However, Esteghlal held on to the lead with much determination and luck and could thank Majidi, Mohammadi and the Saudi Arabian strikers for three points in the end.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\n

Full Highlights on PFDCTV<\/span>:<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n<\/div>\nhttps:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=McTZVF477pI<\/a>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PFDC – JEDDAH, A brace from veteran striker Farhad Majidi handed Esteghlal Tehran a sweet…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22614,"featured_media":10997,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[90],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-c17-asian-competitions"],"views":4445,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22614"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10997"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.persianfootball.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}