After a struggling 2-1 win over Cambodia, the hosts failed to score against Guam -- ranked 204th in the world -- in the entire first-half of their second match. With the crowd booing, they managed to bag full points and a quarterfinal berth with a late rally.

The Argentine coach, who fielded the same lineup as the first match, thought his boys were surprisingly nervous.

"I don't know why they were nervous. We deserved more goals but we lacked efficient scorers and the finishing problem remains a worry as before," said Cruciani after the game.

"There are a lot of technical problems that we have to discuss. However, today's performance was better than the previous match," he added.

"I will sit with the boys before the Palestine game which is crucial. We have to win to finish group champions."

Guam bowed out after two losses but felt happy for conceding just three goals.

"Another day, we could have conceded 11 goals to Bangladesh but we were lucky. They are a very strong team and kept us under pressure for 90 minutes," said Guam coach Norio Tsukitate.