Today, in the AFC U-16 Championship 2018 qualifiers, Maldives under 16 national football team has lost to Syria by 6-0.

It was the last match for both sides in the qualification for the AFC Championship to be held next year.

Maldives has already lost the first two matches against Oman and Tajikistan by 8-0 and 14-0 respectively. With today’s loss Maldives makes it three straight defeats in the campaign conceding total 28 goals without a reply.

In Hisor Central Stadium of Hisor city of Tajikistan, Syria started the game strong to keep their hopes alive to get qualified for the final tournament (AFC U-16 Championship 2018). It was believed Maldives will be defeated by a big margin since they have lose their last match to championship qualification host, Tajikistan by 14-0. But the match turned out was not expected when Maldives managed to keep the score line (6-0) way below then their previous game against Tajikistan.

Syria player, Omar Naghnugh made his name to the score sheet as gave lead to his side at the 7th minute. Just after seven minutes, at the 14th minute mark, midfielder Mohamed Maatouk doubled the lead for Syria. Maldives was kept busy by the very strong Syria side and somehow Maldives juniors hold them enough till the 33rd minute when Syria defender Yasin Abo Krsh made it 3-0. When the match reached its half way line Syria was in the driving seat with a comfortable 3-0 score.

During the second half, a minute to kick-off, Syria again surprised Maldives young players with another goal at the 46th minute. This goal was scored by the Syria forward player, Abdal Rahman. As the game kept growing Syria looked way more strong than Maldives, moving and keeping the possession of the ball comfortably.

At the 58th minute, Syria forwad Ahmed Hatem made it 5-0. Maldives players kept trying to end the match on a least score line unlike their recent 14-0 big margin against Tajikistan. Maldives was succeeding with their plane to hold Syria from scoring another until the added time to the regular play time. During the extra time to regular playing time, Ahmed Amara, who came as a substitute made it 6-0 from a late penalty.

Even Syria won the match by 6-0, they lost the qualifying chance for the next year tournament (AFC U-16 Championship 2018) and Maldives seems satisfied with ending the match in minimum score line.

In AFC U-16 Championship 2018 qualifiers in group B, Maldives was grouped with Tajikistan, Syria and Oman. Turkmenistan also was grouped in group B until they withdraw their name from the qualification for an unknown reason.

The group winners and runner-ups will be qualified for AFC U-16 Championship 2018. As per group standings, Tajikistan is qualified to final tournament next year as they sits at the 1st spot of the group rank with maximum points winning all three qualification matches scoring total 17 goals and conceding none.

At the second spot, Oman sits with 6 points, scoring 14 goals and conceding only one goal. Oman was defeated by group winner Tajikistan in today’s match by 1-0. In the 3rd spot, Syria sits with three points from today’s clash against Maldives. Syria has scored 6 goals and conceded 8 throughout the qualification. And at last Maldives sits at the bottom of the group gaining none points. Maldives was not able to add a goal on their side (scored none) while they have conceded total 28 goals.