Cristiano's magic seals fifth place

Cristiano's fine seventh-minute effort proves enough to secure Adelaide United fifth spot in the Club World Cup.

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YOKOHAMA // Cristiano's fine seventh-minute effort proved enough to secure Adelaide United fifth spot in the Club World Cup. It was a goal that deserved to win the contest, as the Brazilian picked up the ball up on Adelaide's left and embarked on a solo burst which took him within shooting range and he fired a powerful effort past Amir Abdelhamid in the Al Ahly goal.

However, it was a rare moment of brilliance in an otherwise poor game, with the obvious lack of skill in the match once again raising question marks over the validity of the competition in its present form. For Al Ahly it was a disappointing end to a tournament that has finished way below their expectations. As the dominant force in Africa over recent seasons, the Egyptians were expecting to reach the semi-finals and even run Liga de Quito close in the battle to reach Sunday's decider.

But their lack of a killer punch has been exposed and after surrendering a two-goal lead to Pachuca on Sunday they failed to force their way back into this contest too, after falling behind to Cristiano's early strike. Al Ahly's best chance of an equaliser came eight minutes from time, only for Eugene Galekovic's flying stop to deny Mohammed Barakat. * PA Sport . Indeed, the Australians might have had a second through Sasa Ognenovski but this time Abdelhamid made a fine save.