Brazilian side Palmeiras ended Pitso Mosimane and Al Ahly’s hopes of reaching the Fifa Club World Cup final with a 2-0 win over the Egyptian side in the semi-final on Tuesday evening.
The African champions were boosted by the return of some of their stars from the Africa Cup of Nations as Amr El Soleya was thrown straight into the line-up while Mohamed Sherif was named on the bench.
The Brazilian side got off to the brighter start but struggled to threaten the Al Ahly goal.
They, however, made the pressure pay as they finally broke the deadlock in the 39th minute as Rafael Veiga got on the end of a through ball and found the back of the net after beating Al Ahly’s offside trap.
Mosimane would have been hoping for a response from his side in the second half but they were almost immediately dealt a blow as Palmeiras doubled their lead courtesy of a strike from Dudu.
Pitso turned to his bench in the hope of turning the game around and while they did have the ball in the back of the net with 18 minutes left on the clock, the attempt was ruled out for offside by the Video Assistant Referee.
The game then finished on a sour note for Al Ahly as they were reduced to 10 men after Ayman Ashraf was shown a straight red card with nine minutes to play.
The Red Devils will now face off against either Chelsea or Al Hilal in the third/fourth place playoff and will be hoping to secure the bronze medal for second straight year.