Brahimi happy to have scored in World and Arab Cups

by Graeme Jackson

Monday Dec 06, 2021. 10:00

Algeria’s Yacine Brahimi has expressed his joy at having scored goals at both the World Cup and the Arab Cup, after helping the Fennec Foxes to a second win at the latter tournament this past weekend.

Algeria, following an opening 4-0 cruise against Sudan last midweek, had to work harder to get the better of Lebanon in their second Group D match at the tournament in Qatar this past Saturday.

Yet Brahimi opened the scoring with a penalty midway through the second half, paving the way for a 2-0 win. It was the 31-year-old’s second goal at a FIFA tournament, having also netted against South Korea in the group stage of the 2014 World Cup.

“Scoring at the World Cup and then at the Arab Cup makes me extremely happy,” Brahimi told FIFA.com. “I hope that’s not the end of me scoring here, as I’d love to get more goals.”

The Al-Rayyan player added, “We were well aware that the match would be difficult, and that Lebanon tend to defend very well.

“The problem was that we didn’t score early on. Had we done that, things might have been a bit easier, but the most important thing is that we won, and we’re delighted with that.

They certainly made it very difficult for us; we knew that they would defend and rely on counter-attacks.”

Algeria will wrap up their group stage with a clash against arch rivals Egypt in Al Wakrah on Tuesday. Both the Foxes and the Pharaohs have already secured progression to the knockout phase, but the match will still be a fiercely contested one.

“It’s still a match against a strong team,” pointed out Brahimi. “We’ll get a bit of rest after the first two games, because we played those in a short space of time, which might have an impact on us physically.

“The Egypt game is in three days’ time, so we need to concentrate on recovery and then start preparing for that important match. We’ll go into it looking for a victory, because our goal is to win all of our games in Qatar, so we have to keep working hard and to remain focused on this tournament.”