The Dubai club are in great form and defeated Al Jazira on Friday to leapfrog their opponents into top spot.

Czech coach Ivan Hasek is hopeful that domestic momentum will carry over into Asia.

"No doubt, we are on a roll and we hope we can carry forward this form going into such a prestigious competition at the Asian level," Hasek told Gulf News.

"The league is one competition and the AFC Champions League is another. There are two separate ways of preparing for this competition," Hasek admitted.

"A win can do wonders to the morale of a team, and a loss can also do much damage. So we do not want to be over-reactive to this situation. We want to take things one step at a time," Hasek cautioned.

"We have strong teams in our group. Pakhtakor is good and Al Hilal is evenly balanced, but we are not unduly worried about the others as we are more concentrated on what we can lay down as our goals and go ahead and achieve these," Hasek stated.

"I have watched a couple of videos of the Uzbek team and I can now start paying full attention on how to tackle them. I want my boys to take one match at a time," Hasek stated.

Saba Battery of Iran and Al Hilal of Saudi Arabia are the other teams in the group.