Guangzhou's Muriqui roughs Diamonds in group F encounter
Brazilian forward dazzles with two goals to seal 3-0 victory in group F clash against Urawa
Urawa Red Diamonds had no answer for Guangzhou Evergrande's brilliant Brazilian Muriqui as the forward inspired the Chinese Super League champions to a 3-0 win over the 2007 Asian champions in their AFC Champions League opener last night.
Muriqui scored once and made a second as Guangzhou - quarterfinalists in last year's competition - scored an emphatic win over the J.League side at Tianhe Stadium in their group F encounter.
The 26-year-old set up Lucas Barrios for Guangzhou's first in the 16th minute with a mazy run that saw him evade both Urawa defender Tomoaki Makino and goalkeeper Nobuhiro Kato before setting up the Paraguayan with an easy finish.
And 20 minutes into the second half, Muriqui doubled Guangzhou's advantage with a fine strike after a lay off from Gao Lin. A Keita Suzuki own goal in the dying seconds sealed the win for Guangzhou.
"I'm happy that we won and very satisfied with the performance of my team," said Guangzhou's World Cup winning Italian coach Marcello Lippi. "Our opponent's players have good skills, and are very good at controlling a match zonally. The entire match was very smooth, so I'm happy to have this result. We have prepared for it for so long.
"In my team the Chinese internationals were not with us in our training camp and two of them came back with injuries. So we were not in our best shape. However we were able to win in less-than-perfect circumstances, which is very encouraging and inspiring," he said.