Al-Hilal will play Manchester City in the last 16 of the club World Cup after a last victory of the day 2-0 against Mexican Pachuca.
The Saudi team passed the RB Salzburg to qualify behind the winners of the Real Madrid group after the Spanish giants beat the Austrians 3-0 in Philadelphia.
This meant that the goals of Salem Al Dawsari and Marcos Leonardo were sufficient for Al-Hilal to secure a place at the direct elimination stage.
Pachuca, already eliminated after losing her first two games, was alive, but an al-Hilal defense superbly gathered by Kalidou Koulibaly chained, Man Salomon Rondon and limited the Mexicans to long-range fire and half of the chances.
All the highlights of Al Hilal’s 2-0 victory over Pachuca as they advance for the 16 final! pic.twitter.com/4qwlu4kda
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Al-Hilal was sometimes guilty of being a little relaxed, and had some fears by Pachuca when they were deeper to protect their advance in the last quarter, but maintained a victory that gave them five points in Salzburg.
“It was a difficult match, but I think we made an excellent match,” said midfielder Ruben Neves.
“We marked first, we had control and we defended very well. A white sheet and a victory and we have finished. This is the most important thing. “
Nasser Al-Dawsari launched a pass in the area to his Captain Salem, who checked the ball with a touch of his right foot and raised it on the goalkeeper with his second.
Leonardo went to the transverse bar later in the first half and should have scored in the 83rd minute when the sublime approach game al-Hilal left him with only the goalkeeper Sebastian Jurado to beat.
His chip was too weak, however, and Jurado had enough touch to allow the defender Eduardo Bauermann to rid him of the line.
The substitute of Pachuca Illian Hernandez sounded a warning with a powerful head that passed beyond the post in the 84th minute, but Leonardo adjusted all the al-Hilal nerves five minutes after the stop time.
🚨 It’s direct elimination time!
The Route du Stade Metlife is defined 🏟️
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– Dazn Football (@Daznfootball) June 27, 2025
Neves found it in a lot of space in the box and this time, the Brazilian bypassed the goalkeeper and slipped the ball into an empty net.
Manchester City is likely to provide a much more severe test than Pachuca and Neves said that Al-Hilal should play in the same way as they did in their 1-1 draw with Real last week.
“We play, for me, one of the three best world teams. I know them very well,” said the international of Portugal.
“We will do our best, of course, we will prepare the game as we have done in these three games and we will see what happened.”
