Azkals trip Yemenis in World Cup elims

By Olmin Leyba

DOHA – The Philippine Azkals fired warning shots to the rest of the field in Group H of the Fifa World Cup qualifiers as they roared to a 2-0 victory over Yemen Tuesday night before a predominantly Pinoy crowd at Qatar Sports Club Stadium.

Misagh Bahadoran and Iain Ramsay launched the missiles in the second half that leveled the Yemeni defense and cleared the way to their second straight win and a tie with North Korea atop the table with six points. The North Koreans beat Uzbekistan, 4-2, over in Pyongyang.

It was a fiery follow-up to the Azkals’ 2-1 upset of Bahrain last week back home in Bocaue, Bulacan, showing everyone that despite being regarded as the underdog by bettors, they are for real.

“When you win against Bahrain, you feel that the team is really playing well. But this is a confirmation of how far we can still go and how well we’re really playing,” said a happy team manager Dan Palami, whose team will next play Uzbekistan at home Sept. 8 and North Korea on the road a month later.

“We were quite worried because even in betting stations we were the underdogs (against Yemen) but then again, we’re used to that. Even against Bahrain, we were the underdogs. But what’s important is we play our game and we could see that when we do play our game that, we get good results,” he added.

Unleashing an excellent attacking football and a great work rate, the Azkals found the target via the cat-quick Bahadoran (52’) and fancied recruit Ramsay (74’) who each consummated on a fine delivery by Javier Patino to make the day of over 4,000 Filipinos among the 5,200 who braved the 36-degree heat to cheer them on.

“We talked about playing football – moving the ball around and having a nice combination, switching the balls, creating some chances up front. We had some patterns that we tried to work out in training and almost everything worked,” said coach Thomas Dooley.

Luke Woodland, the 19-year-old wunderkind who only got cleared to see action on the eve of the game, made a solid 90-minute debut, teaming up with Daisuke Sato and Jerry Lucena in the three-man backline that helped Neil Etheridge keep a clean sheet.

“Everybody’s outstanding and they worked so hard,” said Dooley who also deployed new face Kevin Ingreso, and Dennis Villanueva for the first time.

Yemen suffered its second consecutive loss at their “home.” The Yemenis dropped a 0-1 setback to North Korea last week here.

“We’re not on the level of Philippines in this game,” said Yemen coach Amin Al-Sunani, whose wards traveled 13 hours by boat and another five by plane out of their conflict-torn country. “Because of the bad situation in our country, we haven’t prepared well, we didn’t even have any friendly matches before our two matches. But I’m glad they did their best.” 

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