Iran and Japan qualified for the Fifa U-20 World Cup finals in South Korea after reaching the semi-finals at the AFC U-19 Championship, being held in Bahrain.
Reza Jafari fired twice in the 14th and 74th minutes to give Iran a hard-fought 2-0 victory over central Asian nation Uzbekistan in the quarter-final tie at Khalifa Sports City Stadium in Isa Town.
The National Stadium hosted yesterday’s last quarter-final match where Koki Ogawa fired a brace in Japan’s resounding 4-0 win over Tajikistan and with it a place in the Fifa U-20 World Cup Korea Republic 2017.
Goals from Ogawa (8th minute) and Ritsu Doan (18th) before the break handed Japan a two-goal advantage in the first half before further goals from Ogawa (73rd) and strike partner Yuto Iwasaki (88th) gave the young Samurai Blue an unassailable lead at Bahrain National Stadium.
The semi-finals are now scheduled for Thursday when Japan takes on Vietnam, who stunned hosts Bahrain 1-0 in the quarter-finals on Sunday.
Match
Saudi Arabia, who defeated Iraq to become the first nation in this tournament to punch their ticket at next year’s U-20 World Cup, will take on Iran in the other semi-final match on Thursday.
Meanwhile, Bahrain coach Abdulaziz Abdo apologised to the Bahraini fans for his team’s heartbreaking defeat to Vietnam on Sunday in their quarter-final match, watching his dreams of reaching their first-ever U-20 World Cup vanish.
“I would like to apologise to all the Bahraini fans who came for this match today,” said Abdo. “Sometimes you have a dream and you think about it a lot but in the end it doesn’t happen. We conceded a goal from a free kick in today’s match and couldn’t get back into the game and for that I would like to say I’m sorry”.
“Don’t blame my players, you can blame me instead. I would like to wish them luck in the future because this generation has good talent and we must try for the coming championship in 2020. The problem was that most of the players do not have enough stamina because most of them are not playing in the Bahraini League,” added Abdo.
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