ABU DHABI: Only when the 90 minutes were up and Qatar’s substitutes raced onto the pitch to celebrate a 2-0 Asian Cup victory was there an inkling that Thursday’s match with Saudi Arabia might have had a little edge to it.
Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed Al Saiari took slight offence and there was 30 seconds of jostling before calm was restored. But worse scenes will be played out on football pitches, from professional to pub level, all over the world this weekend.
“That doesn’t have to do about football so I will not comment on that question,” was Saudi coach Juan Antonio Pizzi’s response when asked about the situation, sticking to the policy both teams had adopted throughout the tournament.
“I think the team celebrated because we played, in our opinion, a great game,” Qatar coach Felix Sanchez said of his players dancing around in front of a group of fans who had come to cheer them on.
“We beat a great team, we won a derby. You have to celebrate this game if you win.”
“Of course it was nice for us to have some supporters with us and at the end of the game we celebrated the win with the people who came here to support us,” said Sanchez. “We wanted to thank them because it’s important to have someone with the team.” Anticipation for the match had only been increased by the performance of the teams, easily dismissing Lebanon and North Korea to set up a group decider. — dpa
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