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MegaSoccer - It taken time for the Asian Champions League to ignite interest amongst fans, but there is nothing like the near demise of a continental giant to grab the attention. Iran's Esteghlal have won Asia's elite tournament in its previous guises in 1970 and 1990, but came mightily close to an embarrassingly early exit yesterday. When the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) took the decision to amalgamate all of its continental competitions into one glorious super tournament it was entering into a brave but unknown world. The lucrative group stage where an estimated US$3 million is up for grabs does not start until March 2003. To add to the confusion, eight teams have already received automatic entry into the group phase, whilst a complex qualifying system is used to determine the other eight finailists. AFC have also in their wisdom decided on a dual qualifying system operating in West and East Asia with teams of the calibre of Esteghlal, Shimizu S-Pulse and Al Ahli rubbing shoulders with the Churchill Brothers, Kopetdag and Monte Carlo (no not that Monte Carlo!) Of course this results in the potential for red faces amongst Asia's glamour clubs, something that Esteghlal nearly found out to their costs. One of Iran's biggest teams, they reached the semi-finals of the Champions Cup last year and are viewed once again by many as one of the favourites to go all the way. Their progression into the lucrative group stage was going smoothly having deposed of Jordanian side Al Faisaly to set-up a clash with Uzbekistan's Neftchi for that all important spot. The Tehran based club should have eased through without any problems having won their home-leg 1-0 and when Yadollah Akbari opened the scoring for Esteghlal in the second-leg it looked all over for the Uzbekistanis. It was anything but. Sergey Ni scored pounced on a mistake from Iranian keeper Sayed Tabatabaei to put the scores on a level footing in the 49th minute. Three minutes later Umid Isakov had put Neftchi into the lead to make the aggregate scores 2-2 on the night and set up a rousing finale. A goal now for the Uzbeck side and Esteghlal would face elimination. Twice the frame of the goal denied the Uzbek side a 3-1 lead, whilst Tabatabaei atoned for his earlier mistake with a series of breathtaking saves. In the end Esteghlal hung on to make it through to the next round. If that is a sign of things to come then the Asian Champions League is set for a rosy future.
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