Palestine beat Tajikistan in penalty shootout to lift Bangabandhu Gold Cup

Palestine have become the unbeaten champions of the Bangabandhu Gold Cup’s fifth edition with a victory over Tajikistan in the final.

Palestine won the match 4-3 in penalty shootout after the normal time ended goalless at the Bangabandhu National Stadium in Dhaka on Friday.

The Palestinians had beaten the Tajiks and Nepal in the group stage and hosts Bangladesh in the semifinals on their way to the final.

Goalkeeper Rami Hamadi was the hero on Friday. He saved spot kicks from Komron Tursunov and Tabrezi Davlatmir.

Palestine’s Jonathan Zorrilla, Mahmoud Ali Usait, Musab Battat and Abdellatif Bahdari scored in the tiebreaker.

In a game full of attacks and counter-attacks, the first real chance came in the 23rd minute when Hilal Musa beat two defenders only to see his shot stopped by Tajikistan goalkeeper Rustom Rezoiv.

Palestine missed another chance two minutes later when Khaled Salem’s effort rattled the post.

The Tajiks were down to 10 men in the 35th minute when Fatxullo Fatxulloev was sent off for punching Sameh Maraaba after being fouled.

Tursunov missed an easy chance when he failed to latch on to a cross by Xikmatullo Rasulov in the 58th minute.

Tajikistan were to be frustrated two more times. Rasulov was flagged offside after putting the ball into the net in the 76th minute and Dilshod Vasiev failed to make contact to a cross in the added time.

In the dying minutes of extra time, Tajikistan substituted goalkeeper Rustom with Khairiev Behrouz but that did little to produce the results they were looking for.