The first showing for an MLS team in the Club World Cup didn’t last long.
The Seattle Sounders, winners of the 2022 Concacaf Champions League, took on Al Ahly on Saturday, and a match that didn’t see much action until the final minutes was decided by a late goal from the Egyptian side.
A tightly-contested first half didn't result in much in the way of scoring chances for either side, yet the Sounders largely were the better side. Yet Al Ahly grew into the game in the second half. As time went on, the 42-time Egyptian Premier League champions created more chances on the counterattack, before Afsha slotted home a deflected shot for the winner in the 88th minute.
Al Ahly will now go on to face Real Madrid in the Club World Cup semifinal.
Seattle reached the competition, which is being staged in Morocco, by beating Liga MX side Pumas in the Concacaf Champions League final last May. It became the first MLS team to win the continental title in the tournament’s 14th iteration.
Al Ahly is making its third straight appearance at the Club World Cup after it qualified by placing second in the CAF Champions League. The 42-time domestic champion has grabbed third in this competition three times, most recently in 2021.
As things got underway in Tangier, Morocco, Al Ahly took hold of the opening minutes of the match but created little in the way of scoring chances. Seattle got the first sight of goal in the 14th minute, when Nicolás Lodeiro got ahold of a volley but sent it wide.
The Sounders grabbed ahold of the match after a shaky first 10 minutes. USMNT forward Jordan Morris had a good look at goal on a corner, but his header bounced harmlessly past the post.
The first half was largely controlled by Seattle. The club who hadn’t played a competitive match since the end of the MLS season in August showed some signs of rust but also its fresh legs. Al Ahly created a couple opportunities on the break, but there wasn’t much in the way of scoring chances for either side.
The Egyptian side finally created a shot on goal out of the break in the 67th minute. The shot was scuffed in the end, though, and things remained scoreless. But the pressure was on from Al Ahly. Since the second half began, Al Ahly had more of the ball and looked like the more dangerous side out of the break.
Finally, with three minutes to play, the breakthrough. Al Ahly pressure for the entire second half paid off. Mohamed Magdy’s chipped effort caromed off the post, and then his follow up deflected off a defender and into the goal past a wrongfooted Seattle goalkeeper.
It’s a heartbreaking result for Seattle. The Sounders had a down year in the league last season, missing out on the MLS Cup playoffs. It will now head home to prepare for the 2023 MLS season, which begins on Feb. 26.
Here were the lineups:
