In one of the craziest and most exciting nights of football, Al Hilal Saudi Arabia caused a resounding surprise by eliminating European and world champion Manchester City from the eighth final of the Club World Cup, after an exciting victory with a score of 4-3 after extra time, in a match that will remain engraved in the memory of the tournament for a long time, and was held at the stadium.«Camping World Stadium» in Orlando, USA.
The two teams entered the match with all their names and stars, and the intentions seemed clear from the beginning, as City did not wait long to open the scoring, as Portuguese Bernardo Silva scored the first goal in the 9th minute, benefiting from a through pass that ended a quick technical sentence into Al Hilal’s net, giving the English team the lead.1 - 0.But Al Hilal refused to be just extras in the English party, and waited until the beginning of the second half to announce its return to the match strongly, when Brazilian Marcos Leonardo was able to adjust the score in the 46th minute, after receiving a ball inside the area and shooting it confidently past Ederson.
The response was not delayed, and after only six minutes, Al Hilal returned to shock the world again, when the other Brazilian, Malcolm, scored the lead goal in the 52nd minute, taking advantage of a wonderful through pass that put him face to face in front of the goal, putting the ball into the far corner.But Manchester City quickly regained its balance, and found what it was looking for through its Norwegian scorer, Erling Haaland, who adjusted the score to 2-2 in the 55th minute with a powerful shot inside the area, amid the astonishment of the fans who began to realize that they were facing a match that would go off script.The tie continued until the end of regular time, with the two teams ruling for two additional periods, and there, excitement flared up again, and Al Hilal was the initiator again, when Senegalese defender Kalidou Coulibaly rose above everyone, and scored the third goal from a powerful header in the 94th minute after a tight corner kick, to ignite the stands.Blue with joy.
But City did not give up, and brought the match back to the equalizer again thanks to a goal scored by substitute Phil Foden in the 104th minute after a quick counterattack, which made the score 3-3.At a time when everyone thought that penalty kicks were close, Marcos Leonardo fired his second coup de grace in the match, and Al Hilal's fourth in the 112th minute, taking advantage of a huge defensive lapse, to go alone with the goal and score the historic qualifying goal amid the collapse of the Citizens.
Thus, Al Hilal has well-deservedly reached the quarter-finals, where it will face Fluminense of Brazil, which had surpassed Inter Milan of Italy by two unanswered goals, in an awaited Latin-Saudi summit.Al-Hilal's victory was not just a qualification, it was an explicit announcement of a strong presence of the Saudi League in the world's top arena... In front of the Premier League giants, with Saudi, European, Latin and Senegalese stars, Al Hilal wrote a new chapter of its glory in the sky of world football.
