Bangladesh national football team made it through the next round of the Joint Qualifiers for the 2026 FIFA World Cup and 2027 AFC Asian Cup following a 2-1 win over the Maldives rival in a pre-qualifier round match at the Bashundhara Kings Arena in Dhaka on Tuesday.
Winning the match was very important for Bangladesh. The disciples of Javier Fernandez were badly in need of a win to confirm the next round of the qualifying stage of the World Cup.
Recently, Bangladesh played a 1-1 tie with the Maldives in the away match at Male. After the win on Tuesday, the boys now have the opportunity to play the next six international matches of the next qualifying round.
Now, the boys will have to face strong Australia in the next match on November 16 in Australia.
On Tuesday, the Maldives boys were near to taking a lead in the second minute following miss pass from defenders Tariq Raihan Kazi and Sakil Hossain.
Bangladesh opened the net in the 12th minute of the match as striker Foysal Ahmed Fahim carried the ball up on the left flank and took a cross towards the centre of the box where striker Rakib Hossain placed the flying cross into the post with his right foot.
In the next minute, Bangladesh defender Saad Uddin almost gifted an equaliser to the opponents. The Maldives midfielder Hamza Mohamed took a corner and Bangladesh defender Saad while trying to clear the ball almost placed the ball home if Bangladesh custodian Mitul Marma had not taken control over the ball after jumping on the ground.
Bangladesh missed a good chance to double the lead in the 35th minute when striker Rakib failed to send a pass of Jamal into the post.
The Maldives boys made it equal in the next minute as their midfielder Aisam Ibrahim headed on a corner of midfielder Hamza into the post.
Returning from the halftime break, Bangladesh boys kept pushing through the opponent's defence-line. Finally, in the 47th minute, the host boys in the red and green outfits managed to score the second lead. Defender Saad quickly went up on the left flank and took a shot towards goal and the Maldives' alert custodian fisted the ball and Bangladesh midfielder Sohel Rana passed the bounced ball to nearby fellow striker Foysal Ahmed Fahim who wasted no time to hit the near post.
In 60th minute, Bangladesh became a ten-man battalion as a second yellow card was shown to Md Sohel Rana for an unprofessional deed.
Bangladesh midfielder Jamal Bhuiyan gave the captain's armband to striker Rakib Hossain after being replaced by striker Mojibor Jony in the 67th minute. For quite some time, Jamal has been a 65-minute player in the team.
Interestingly, the Maldives too became equal to Bangladesh in the number of players as its defender Ahnaf Rasheed was shown a direct red card for dangerously grounding Bangladesh striker Rakib near the box.
Finally, Bangladesh succeeded in maintaining the lead till the long whistle and secured the next six matches of the joint qualifiers of the 2026 FIFA World Cup and AFC Asian Cup.
Crowd in support of Palestine
A large number of Bangladesh supporters were also carrying the flag of Palestine and placards that had Free Palestine written on them.
