Nanjing: They were made to sweat for it a little in the end, but Shanghai SIPG progressed to the 2017 AFC Champions League quarter-finals on Wednesday after beating Jiangsu FC 3-2 to seal a 5-3 aggregate win in the Round of 16.
Both sides boast some world-class individual players, but in the end it was Shanghai’s Brazilian brawn that won the day.
The immovable object vs. the unstoppable force
On paper this looked like an archetypal ‘immovable object versus unstoppable force’ fixture.
Coming into the match Shanghai had scored 17 goals to Jiangsu’s 10 in this year’s AFC Champions League (just one less than Urawa Red Diamonds’ tournament-best tally of 18), but Jiangsu had kept four clean sheets to Shanghai’s one.
Another shutout for Jiangsu here would have left them needing just a single goal to progress to the quarter-finals, but a moment’s hesitation at the back eliminated that possibility and gifted Elkeson Shanghai’s crucial 34th minute opener, swinging the tie irretrievably away from the hosts.
Shanghai gifted advantage by lapse in concentration
The first goal was always going to be crucial in this fixture, and in the end it was unbelievably simple in both creation and conversion.
In the 34th minute He Guen played a free-kick to Hulk on the half-way line, and after carrying the ball forward slightly the Brazilian drove a through-ball in behind for Elkeson to chase.
Jiangsu had been resilient in defence all campaign, but a moment’s hesitation by Hong Jeon-ho was all Elkeson needed, and the two-time AFC Champions League winner stole in to prod the ball beyond the exposed Zhang Sipeng and set Shanghai on their way.
Hulk helps with high-class hold-up play
When it came to decisive contributions in the final third, Elkeson was once again the main man for Shanghai, but his fellow Brazilian Hulk also played a pivotal role here.
As well as scoring Shanghai’s late winner, his teammates also benefited from the 30-year-old’s ability to hold the ball up and bring others into the game.
Over the 90 minutes Hulk was frequently the recipient of passes from Shanghai’s key creators, for instance, being found 13 times by Oscar and 11 by Odil Ahmedov.
Photos: Lagardère Sports
Source: the-afc.com