Marcelo Gallardo and another hard stumble in Saudi Arabia: he falls in front of the leader and walks away from the fight

He Al Ittihad Marcelo Gallardo suffered a serious blow this Friday when he visited the leader of the Saudi Professional League, the 22nd. Al Hilal, the comfortable leader of the tournament, won 3-1 and extended its lead at the top of the table. The Argentine coach’s team seemed to have put the bad results behind them with a six-match unbeaten run, but the streak was ended.

The Jeddah team, without Frenchman Karim Benzema (injured), suffered their first defeat of the year against the leader, Al Hilal. The team of Doll They had taken the lead thanks to a goal from N’ Golo Kanté, but the joy soon faded.

After 38 minutes the team Neymar (he is recovering from a serious ankle injury) managed to equalize the match after a rebound which he took advantage of Saleh Al Shehri. Three minutes later, Al Ittihad had a penalty in their favor, but VAR disallowed the penalty.

Already in the second half the dynamics of the match changed: Al Hilal showed why they are heading for the league title and with two goals in 21 minutes they wrote history. First, at 13 years old, he made it 2-1 with a goal of Malcolm; and at 21 he sealed the victory with a personal play of Saud Abdulhamid.

This defeat ends the undefeated and excellent start of the team led by Marcelo Gallardo., which ranks fifth in the ranking with 37 units. For his part, With this victory, Al Hilal increases its lead to continue to be the sole leader of the competition with 62 units, nine more than his rival Al Nassr.

Marcelo Gallardo and his team will have revenge

Next Tuesday, March 5, both teams will meet again. This time, for the quarter-finals of the Asian Championswhere the team formed by Kanté, Benzema and co will try to take a fundamental step in the continent’s top tournament.

The first match will be played again on the Al Hilal pitch and a week later the key will be defined King Abdullah Sports Citythe house of Al Ittihad.