Court drama as Jordan win through

Reserve Jordanian forward Zaid Abbas helped his team complete an incredible 99-91overtime win against Kazakhstan in the men's quarterfinal at Basketball Indoor Hall. Abbas had played only one minute in regular time before coming on to the court in overtime.

He grabbed a crucial offensive rebound and scored two free throws, before an amazing intercept finished by a slam dunk gave Jordan a five-point lead with 1:01 remaining.

This essentially sealed the game and eliminated a stunned Kazakh side, who had been seconds away from a place in the semifinal near the end of regular time. Veteran Jordanian captain Zaid Al Khas was inspirational in those dying seconds. Down by six points, with less then a minute to play, members of the large Jordanian support squad had already started to leave the stadium.

Thirty five year-old Al Khas had other ideas: he scored four points in the final minute, including the game-tying basket with less than 10 seconds left on the clock, to send the game into overtime and the Jordanian contingent into raptures.

With the fulltime score tied at 82-82, Jordan were inspired during the overtime period and scored 17 points to Kazakhstan's nine. Al Khas finished the game as the leading scorer with 30 points and grabbed 11 rebounds, while the influential Fadel Al Najjar of Jordan scored 17 points. Kazakhstan's impressive 18 year-old forward Anton Ponomarev netted 21 points and 11 rebounds, while 19 year-old guard Rustam Yargaliyev was also an outstanding performer for his team with 26 points.

Kazakhstan were under-manned in the final stages with three players, Yevgeniy Issakov, Dmitriy Korovnikov and Mikhail Yevstigneyev, all fouling out. After their thrilling victory, Jordan's Portugese coach Mario Palma said, "We started off playing very well for the first 25 minutes of the game and then our boys started getting nervous and started missing easy shots.

"We couldn't defend the pick-and-roll that Kazakhstan was using against us as they are very good at that. We found out that we were really successful when we started pressing them full court. When we got into overtime we knew that we were mentally and physically better prepared that Kazakhstan."

Looking toward's the semifinals, where they will play the winner of the China-Korea match, which takes place at 17:00 on Wednesday, he said, "We know if it is going to be China it will be very difficult, but my boys can play against them. I am very happy right now that Jordan is on the map in Asia as far as basketball is concerned."

Jordan captain Zaid Al Khas said, "It was a comeback, but hats off to Kazakhstan, they played a great game, and in the second half took the lead. But one thing about Jordan is that we never give up. We got the three-point [baskets] when we needed them and got the rebound and the put-back to force overtime. We will enjoy this win for the next 10 or fifteen minutes and then we will start to get ready for either China or Korea."

15th Asian Games, Doha 2006