Thanks to two late goals in injury time, Jordan stunned Kuwait 2-0 in their second group B game at the 2004 Asian Cup at Shan Dong stadium Friday in Jinan.

"I should congratulate my players, they really did a good job tonight, which gave all our fans and me a surprise," said Jordan coach Mahmoud Gohary at the news conference after winning the game.

Jordan's defender Khaled Saed became the star of the game one minute into the injury time when he scored his team's winning opener by thrusting to the goalmouth to tip home the ball bouncing from the bar.

"We kept on giving Kuwait pressure during the game, and finally it got paied off," added Gohary.

One minute later Jordan's second substitute Anas sealed the victory with a low flash shot in the penalty box. Kuwait's goal keeper S H Kankone made correct reaction but mysteriously failed to touch the ball.

"It was nice to have this kind of late enjoyment givan by the fact that we played with less one man than our opponents," added Gohary, who apparently was surprised by his team's late win.

Jordan, who had stunned Asia by forcing South Korea to a goalless draw last week continued to adopt their effective tactics of ferocious defense and threatening Kuwait by long distance shots in today's match.

However, Kuwait got the first scoring chance 10 minutes into the game when their spearhead N Al Mutairi shot just right out side of the box, but only saw the ball slicely missed the bar.

"We have so many chances to make a goal, but we were so unlucky in this game, lacking of experience, our players could not deal with the situation well in the game." said Kuwait assistant coach Al Shmary sadlly.

Jordan began to find their pace to fight back after their playmaker Abu Alieh beat Kuwait's defense to make a sharp shot in the penalty area, but the ball was denied by Kuwait's goalkeeper SH KanKone.

Kuwait, who swept United Arab Emirates 3-1 last week to gain their temporarily first place of the group, began to control the match after Jordan's captain Faisal was sent off after directly receiving a red card from Chinese referee Lu Jun who saw clearly he fouled on Kuwait's forward B.A Mutwa from behind.

"We did not take the opportunity to win the game, which was really a pity for our team," added Shmary.

Jordan, who beat Kuwait 2-1 in the 2002 Arab Cup, did not give Kuwait any chance to score in the rest of the game.

Source: Xinhua