TEHRAN – Persepolis captain Jalal Hosseini believes that they will have a difficult task to book a place in the final match of the AFC Champions League since Al Sadd will travel to Tehran to beat them.

Persepolis edged past the Qatari giants 1-0 in the first leg of the ACL semi-finals last week in Doha’s Jassim bin Hamad Stadium, thanks to Ali Alipour’s goal in the 86th minute from the penalty spot.

The Iranian team will host Al Sadd on October 23 at the Azadi Stadium in Tehran for the second leg.

“We defeated Al Sadd in the first match with a remarkable performance but they have professional players and will travel to Tehran to beat us,” Hosseini said.

“Persepolis are facing shortage of players because we have been banned in last two transfer windows. We will not have our experienced defender Hossein Mahini and it’s a major blew for our team,” he added.  

“Hopefully, we can defeat strong Al Sadd and advance to the AFC Champions League for the first time and make our fans happy,” Hosseini concluded.