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Saudis land safely in Rostov after engine fire

June 19, 2018

ROSTOV-ON-DON — Saudi Arabia’s national soccer team landed safely in Rostov-on-Don, Russia Monday evening, after an apparent engine fire on the plane carrying the players to a World Cup match.

Russia’s aviation watchdog Rosaviatsya said that during the landing there was a brief fire on one of the engines and that it would investigate the incident, Interfax reported. Social and Saudi media footage also appeared to show one of the engines catching fire, but a spokesman for airline Rossiya denied a fire had occurred and said the fault was due to a bird strike.

The team was travelling on a Rossiya Airbus A319 from St Petersburg to Rostov-on-Don, where they are due to play their second Group A match against Uruguay Wednesday.

As it came in to land, the plane “suffered a technical fault with one of its engines, with a bird getting caught seen as the preliminary cause,” a Rossiya airlines spokesman said in a statement.

Reports of a fire in one of the engines were incorrect, the spokesman added.

“Nothing threatened the safety of the passengers. The aircraft’s landing took place in a routine fashion. No warning was sounded during the landing.”

Videos shared on social media showed an aircraft that posters identified as the Saudi team’s plane with its wing on fire while it was in the air.

The footage, which Reuters was unable to verify independently, was shared by civil aviation monitoring website Airlive.net, which said the fire broke out on the approach to Rostov airport.

“All the Saudi national team players are safe, after a technical failure in one of the airplane engines ... and now they’re heading to their residence safely,” a statement said on Twitter.

“I want to reassure you that we got to Rostov safely, it was a simple technical fault in the airplane but thank God we are now in the hotel and things are good,” Osama Hawsawi, captain of the Saudi team, said in a video shared on social media.

“The whole delegation is well,” midfielder Hattan Bahebri said in a video shared on the team’s official Twitter page.

“Of course, we were a bit frightened, but thank God,” he added, laughing.

After shipping five goals against host Russia — the lowest-ranked team in the World Cup — Saudi Arabia could probably do with facing a rival other than South American powerhouse Uruguay and its star forward Luis Suarez.

Uruguay is hoping to appease some worries after only beating Egypt 1-0 thanks to a late goal.

Bizarrely, two-time World Cup champion Uruguay has never beaten the ‘Green Falcons’; Saudi Arabia won a friendly in 2002 while a 2014 friendly ended in a draw.

In another potential source of reassurance for the perennially underachieving Saudis, the usually ruthless Suarez missed three chances against Egypt Friday in their opening game.

But Group A favorite Uruguay is still widely expected to beat Saudi Arabia, the second-lowest World Cup team in the FIFA rankings at No. 67.

Nevertheless, the South Americans are guarding against complacency. Asked by a reporter whether beating the Saudis would essentially guarantee passing the group stage, defender Jose Gimenez pushed back.

“Easy, easy. We need to keep a cool head. We know that any game here is very hard, and we need to think of it that way. I think that if Uruguay do things right we have a lot of chances of passing,” said Gimenez, who scored the 89th-minute header against Egypt.

Saudi Arabia seems unlikely to emulate the surprisingly strong performances of underdogs Mexico and Switzerland.

“There is no doubt that facing the Uruguayan team is difficult and that it is known for its international stars, but we are determined to improve our image from the previous match and the joy of the Saudi fans,” said Saudi Arabia midfielder Taisir Al-Jassim. — Reuters


June 19, 2018
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