Al Shabab continued their impressive start to the season with a 2-1 victory over Dubai rivals Al Nasr at the Maktoum Bin Rashid Al Maktoum Stadium on Thursday night.
After fighting back to stun reigning champions Al Ahli last week, Shabab made it two wins from two thanks to goals from Henrique Luvannor and Carlos Villanueva.
Al Nasr pulled one back through Ali Al Ameri, but any hopes of producing a fightback were ultimately dashed when Mahmoud Khamis was given his marching orders for a second bookable offence with 25 minutes remaining.
Shabab carved out their first opening of the game after 24 minutes when Luvannor’s powerful free-kick was palmed away by Nasr goalkeeper Mohammas Ghuloom before Khamis made a goal-line clearance from the resulting corner.
Shabab didn’t have to wait long to make the breakthrough, though; Luvannor firing home into the bottom left corner from the edge of the area.
Villanueva doubled Shabab’s lead in first-half injury time when he tapped in the rebound after his initial header rebounded off the post from an Edgar Bruno flick-on.
Al Nasr dragged themselves back into the match eight minutes after the break when Al Ameri grabbed his second goal in successive games, thumping home from a corner.
Nasr’s attempts to get back on level terms were thwarted when Khamis saw red for a second booking and the Blue Wave subsequently slumped to their first defeat of the season.
Elsewhere, Sharjah earned their first win of the season with a thumping 4-2 victory over newly-promoted Ittihad Kalba at the Sharjah Stadium.
Brazilian striker Luan opened the scoring for the hosts after 25 minutes before Yousif Saeed Juma doubled the lead six minutes after the interval.
Sharjah made it 3-0 thanks to a Hassan Mohamed own goal with 10 minutes left to play before Brazilian forward Wanderley completed the rout three minutes later.
Sharjah gifted Kalba two consolation goals in injury time, with Luis Leal scoring a late brace.
