Despite being forced to make wholesale changes due to the suspension of seven players, the Uzbek side completely dominated proceedings at MHSK Stadium and claimed a deserved victory thanks to goals by Zaynitdin Tadjiyev and Odil Ahmedov.

Pakhtakor had already been eliminated from knockout stage contention after a 2-2 draw at Al Qadisiya two weeks ago but Haydarov said that it did not diminish the importance of the game for his team.

"After losing our chance to qualify for the quarter-finals, people were thinking that this match would not be important, but we were still playing for our supporters," said the former Uzbekistan national coach.

"There were questions of how we would perform without so many of our key players but I think that we gave a good response today.

"But I must thank Alexander Kletskov and Renat Bayramov, who played in the match today despite still nursing injuries," Haydarov added.

Qatar League champions Al Gharafa finished their campaign with only two points from six games but coach Marcos Paqueta explained the difficulties that he had putting together a team for what was for them a meaningless end-of-season affair.

"We came here with our second squad as a number of our regular players have left to train with their national teams," said the Brazilian.

"Our season has just finished and we have a number of injured players so today was really a match between two young teams.

"There were also circumstances that prevented us from getting to Tashkent with enough time for proper preparation," he added.