Al Ain’s historic top scorer, Laba, celebrates his birthday in front of Kalba’s net

Al Ain Club’s all-time top scorer, Togolese international Laba Kodjo, celebrated his 34th birthday, which falls today, in the best possible way, after he led Al-Zaeem to achieve a valuable victory over Kalba with a score of 3-1, regaining the top spot in the ADNOC Professional Football League standings, in the match that was held this Tuesday evening at Kalba Stadium, in the presence of about a thousand spectators, the majority of whom were “Purple” fans.
Laba Kodjou, who started his 34th year, scored the first goal for Al Ain in the 47th minute in a wonderful way, breaking the goalless tie that ended in the first half, before his Moroccan colleague Sofiane Rahimi added the second goal from inside the penalty area in the 64th minute.
Kalba succeeded in reducing the difference through Ahmed Nour Allah in the 79th minute, but its attempts to achieve an equalizer suffered a severe blow due to the numerical deficiency after the expulsion of defender Ahmed Abu Namous in the 80th minute, before its suffering was doubled by Al Ain scoring the third goal by Matias Palacios in the 88th minute.

With this victory, Al Ain raised its score to 34 points at the top of the standings temporarily, awaiting Shabab Al Ahly’s confrontation with Ajman tomorrow evening, while Kalba’s score froze at 16 points in eighth place.
It is noteworthy that Laba Kodjo’s goal raised his scoring tally to 134 goals, placing him in fifth place on the list of all-time top scorers in the league competition, after he broke up the partnership with Al-Shaab Club legend Adnan Taliani.