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China vows to beat Iran at home in World Cup qualifier

Xinhua, September 5, 2016 Adjust font size:

China coach Gao Hongbo on Monday expressed his confidence to beat Iran here on Tuesday in their second match of the 2018 FIFA World Cup Asian Zone qualifiers' last round.

The last round witnesses 12 Asian teams vie for four-and-a-half berths. China were drawn into Group A with South Korea, Iran, Uzbekistan, Syria and Qatar, while Group B has Australia, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Thailand and Iraq.

Through two round-robin, home-and-away matches, the top two of each group will qualify for the World Cup finals directly. The third-placed teams of each group will play a home-and-away series and the winner will advance to the intercontinental play-off against a team from CONCACAF.

During the first game of the last round on Sept. 1, China lost to South Korea 3-2 in Seoul, and Iran beat Qatar 2-0 in Tehran.

The 50-year-old Gao spoke highly of the Chinese fans in Seoul, saying, "The fans gave our players courage when we got into troubles in the first match against South Korea."

Gao told the pre-match press conference here that "To win the game is the only target to every coach, and that is the core value of my work."

Answering a question about Wu Lei, the forward who wasted some chances in the first game against South Korea, Gao said, "There is few local forward in the first teams of the Chinese Super League. Wu is 26 years old. His maturity can help us." Endit