The former Lebanon champions are no strangers to the tournament having featured in three previous editions with their best performance coming five years ago when they reached the quarter-finals.

Al Ahed entertain Uzbeks Nasaf at Beirut Sports City stadium high in confidence after recently climbing to the top of their domestic league and Hamoud is hopeful they can perform equally well on the continental stage.

"We are ready for the game against Nasaf as we had a good win against Shabab Al Sahel in our domestic league," he said. "That game has given us a welcome boost ahead of this AFC Cup match.

"Winning on Wednesday is very important for us because the three points will be key for the next matches as we have to meet two other big teams (Syria’s Al Jaish and Kazma from Kuwait).

"I’m confident that the players will be ready and I believe they will have a good match and get the necessary victory. We will get a good result as the players are determined to win."

The game for Nasaf, who reached the semi-finals of the 2002 Asian Club Championship, will be their first competitive match this year with the Uzbek League not due to start until next month.

As a result, coach Victor Kumykov is hoping their lack of match action will not work in Al Ahed’s favour.

"Unfortunately we go into the game without preparing well," said the 46-year-old Russian. "We have had a preparatory camp recently and we have played some friendly matches but this is not enough to prepare for the game.

"We don’t know much about Lebanese football as we have only got information about it through the internet and we also don’t know anything about their style.

"I was hoping that our situation could be like Al Ahed’s as they are currently playing in their domestic league but in Uzbekistan the league will only start next month and this could be a disadvantage for us.