Al-Hilal defeated Mexico’s Pachuca 2-0 to reach the knock-out phase of the FIFA Club World Cup on Thursday, the first victory of the big outspoken Saudi club of the tournament enough to send it as a group H second behind Real Madrid.
Salem Al-Dawsari opened the score in the 22nd minute and Marcos Leonardo added the second in a stop time to earn a last 16 collision with Manchester City in Orlando on Monday.
Pachuca, already eliminated after losing his first two games, was lively, but an al-Hilal defense, excellent marbled by Kalidou Koulibaly, chained danger man Salomon Rondon and limited the Mexicans to long-distance shots and half opportunities.
Al-Hilal was guilty of it sometimes a bit casual and got a few fears from Pachuca while it tried to protect his lead in the last quarter, but held for a victory that gave five points to the four of Red Bull Salzburg.
«It was a difficult game, but I think we did a great game,» said midfielder Ruben Neves.
«We first scored, we had control and we defended very well. A clean sheet and a victory and we are through it. That is the most important thing.»
The Al-Hilal team is full of top players who are assembled expensive from all over the world, but the opening goal came from a combination of two home-soil talents.
Nasser Al-Dawsari took possession in the last third part and brought a pass in the area to his Captain Salem, who checked the ball with one touch of his right foot and Terlde with his second over the goalkeeper.
Leonardo crossed the bar later in the first half and had to score in the 83rd minute when the Sublime Al-Hilal-Tacht game had him beat with the only goalkeeper Sebastian Jurado.
His chip, however, was too weak and Jurado got enough to leave a touch to allow defender Eduardo Bauermann to remove it from the line.
Pachuca replacement Illian Hernandez sounded a warning with a powerful header that flashed past the pole in the 84th minute, but Leonardo established all al-Hilal nerves for five minutes in the stop time.
Neves found him in a lot of space in the box, and this time the Brazilian called off the goalkeeper and put the ball in an empty net.
Manchester City will probably offer a lot of star test than Pachuca, and Neves said that Al-Hilal had to play in the same way as in his 1-1 draw with Real last week.
«We play one of the top three teams in the world for me. I know them very well,» said the Portugal International.
«We will do our best, of course we will prepare the game as we did in these three games and we will see what happened.»
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