We overcame our ‘fear’, reveals Ebrahimzadeh

AFC – JEDDAH, Iran’s Zob Ahan overcame a nervous first-half display to fight back from a two-goal deficit at the interval to earn a 2-2 draw with last year’s AFC Champions League finalists Al Ittihad at the Prince Abdullah Al Faisal Stadium on Tuesday.

Goals from Abdul-Malik Ziaya and captain Mohammed Noor seemed to have Al Ittihad on course to bounce back from their 3-0 defeat by Bunyodkor in last month’s Group B opener.

But Mansour Ebrahimzadeh’s Hazfi Cup winners pulled a goal back through Fahadi Esmaeil five minutes after the break before Mohammed Ghazi completed the comeback just two minutes later.

“Al Ittihad is a big team with a lot of experience and my players might have feared their opponents,” said Ebrahimzadeh.

“Because of that, Al Ittihad dominated the first half and scored two goals, though, we lost a real chance in the beginning of that half when the Al Ittihad keeper saved.

“But after their two goals, Al Ittihad’s players thought that the match would end in their favour.

“I told my players that the match is 90 minutes and they have another 45 minutes to play.

“We took advantage of two chances and levelled the score.

“Al Ittihad is a very strong team and I hope we qualify along with them.”

Zob Ahan maintained their unbeaten start to the campaign after defeating Al Wahda 1-0 in their opening fixture to sit two points behind Uzbekistan champions Bunyodkor, who beat the UAE side 2-1 in Abu Dhabi on Tuesday.

Al Ittihad coach Enzo Trossero had promised a reaction from his players following the defeat by Bunyodkor but was left to rue a string of wasted first-half chances and a disastrous drop in performance after the break.

“We are so sad with this draw which means a loss to us,” said the former Argentina international

“We performed well during the first half, but things changed unexpectedly.

“If my players had continued their first-half performance the result would have been great. There were some errors in my team’s backline and I promise to correct the situation.

“If you look at the video of the first half you will see that Al Ittihad wasted five chances. Because of that we can’t say that Zob Ahan were better than Al Ittihad.

“You could see this with how happy the Zob Ahan players were after the match, while our players were not pleased with the draw.”