Albion at the Asian Cup: Round of 16 Round Up
Both Maty Ryan and Alireza Jahanbakhsh played huge roles in their respective Asian Cup second round ties as Australia and Iran proceeded to the last eight of the tournament.
Ryan saved two spot kicks as the Socceroos overcame Uzbekistan in a penalty shoot out while Alireza Jahanbakhsh opened the scoring as Iran eased through 2-0 against Oman.
Nothing could separate Australia and their opponents in a tense encounter in Al Ain, the game ending 0-0 after 120 minutes with Ryan’s impact beginning long before the tie headed to a dreaded shoot out.
The Albion’s number one pulled off an excellent one-handed stop from Eldor Shomuradov as early as the 10th minute before his later heroics from 12 yards.
His first penalty save came from Islom Tukhtakhodjaev, psyching the Uzbekistan defender out before standing tall to complete a vital block from a kick placed straight down the middle.
The second saw Ryan dive to his right to get a big hand to substitute Marat Bikmaev’s spot kick, handing Mathew Leckie the opportunity to send Australia into the last eight and a date with host nation the United Arab Emirates, which Leckie duly took. That quarter final takes place on Friday afternoon.
While Brighton supporters are no strangers to Ryan’s penalty saving abilities having seen him pull off an outrageous last minute save to earn a point away at Stoke City last season and then keep out Wayne Rooney’s effort at Everton a month later, these were surprisingly his first two penalty saves for the Socceroos. Not a bad time to start.
Jahanbakhsh meanwhile started his second game of the tournament after returning from 11 weeks out with a “minor hamstring injury” and he marked it with his first goal since netting in an international friendly against Bolivia in October.
Iran goalkeeper Alireza Beiranvand channeled his inner-Ryan to keep out a penalty from Oman’s Ahmed Al Mahaijri inside of the first five minutes with Jahabakhsh punishing that miss when he opened the scoring just after the half hour mark.
Brighton’s record buy took advantage of a touch heavier than John Prescott from Mohammed Al-Musallami to race clear and convincingly finish the one-on-one opportunity past Faiz Al-Rushaidi.
Iran doubled their lead before half time through a Ashkan Dejagah penalty after Saad Al-Mukhaini was controversially adjudged to have fouled Mehdi Taremi in the box.
And that’s how it finished as Carlos Queiroz’s side recorded their fourth clean sheet in four games at the competition, strengthening their position as the 5/2 second favourites to win the tournament for the first time since 1976.
Iran and Jahanbakhsh will now face China in the quarter finals on Thursday.
