The Saudi national team is facing a long-awaited step, when it faces its Emirati counterpart on Tuesday evening at the Al-Enmaa Stadium in the King Abdullah Sports City in Jeddah, in the final of the Arabian Gulf Football Cup - Gulf 27, looking to end a long absence from the podium, and regain a title that the “Greens” last achieved in the 2003 edition.
Since that coronation, which represented the third Gulf title in the history of Saudi Arabia after the 1994 and 2002 editions, more than two decades have passed without “Al-Akhdar” succeeding in adding a new championship to its record, and this time it finds itself facing an exceptional opportunity on its home soil and among its fans to lift the cup for the fourth time.
The fourth title will not merely be an end to years of waiting; It will give Saudi Arabia the opportunity to equal Iraq in second place on the list of teams that won the most Gulf Cup titles with 4 titles each, behind Kuwait, which tops the historical record with 10 titles.
The Saudi team reached the decisive stage with an ideal journey in terms of results, which began by topping the first group with a full score after 3 consecutive victories over Kuwait 1-0, Oman 3-0, and Iraq 2-0, before facing Qatar in the semi-finals and surpassing them on penalties 3-2, after continuing the goalless draw in the original and extra time.
“Al-Akhdar” carries with him a remarkable number to the final, after maintaining a clean sheet throughout his four matches, making the defensive aspect one of his most prominent strengths in the tournament, despite the injuries and absences that the team faced during its journey.
The Greek Georgios Donis, coach of the Saudi national team, is betting on the spirit shown by his players during the tournament to overcome the final step, and he said in the press conference that preceded the final: “The weapon to achieve the championship is the spirit of the players; And their fighting spirit.”
Donis acknowledged the difficult conditions his team experienced as a result of the successive matches, saying: “It is not easy to play against a team that relies on low defense. In 11 days, we played 4 matches, and we had some injuries, and the weather conditions were difficult.”
The Greek coach expressed his satisfaction with what his team did defensively, adding: “I think we did a good defensive job, and we focused on set pieces on both the offensive and defensive sides.”
The Saudi players are looking forward to crowning their journey with the cup, which was expressed by Mohammed Kanno, the “Green” midfielder, when he said: “We reached the final, and this was our ambition, and God willing, we will achieve the championship,” stressing that the Emirati team is a “strong team,” and that the goal is to make the Saudi fans happy.
The Saudi Green suffered from injuries that affected its players at various stages of the tournament, which ended with Nawaf Al-Aqidi, the goalkeeper, being excluded due to injury, and Hassan Kadesh, then Alaa Al Hajji, withdrew.
On the other hand, the UAE national team enters the final with a similar ambition to end a wait that has extended since its last coronation in 2013, and seek to add the third title to its coffers after the 2007 and 2013 titles.
“The Whites” had a strong campaign in the tournament under the leadership of their new Croatian coach, Zlatko Dalic. It topped the second group with 7 points after two victories and a draw, and scored 8 goals against one goal conceded, before beating the Omani team 1-0 in the semi-finals.
The final will be the biggest test for Dalic since he took over the leadership of the Emirates shortly before the start of the tournament, but he chose to relieve the pressure on his players before the confrontation, and said in the press conference: “Tomorrow will be the easiest match; “Because it is the final, and I hope the players and the audience enjoy the match.”
He added: “We will play against one of the strongest teams in the tournament and in front of its fans, and I know that the Saudi team has a strong team and a strong coach, and God willing, we will perform at our best.”
Dalic realizes the importance of set pieces in the final calculations, especially against a team that showed its ability to benefit from them during the tournament. He said: “Fix balls are an important point for every team, but we did not have enough time to work on them. We will play against a team that is good at them, and we must defend against them well.”
The Croatian coach is looking for a quick culmination of the beginning of his Emirati experience, based on his long experience in international football. He said: “I have 9 years of experience in international football, and my goal is to achieve the best possible thing for the team. The best start for this will be in the final, and I will try to provide all my experience to the players, and I want to start this journey by winning the tournament.”
As for Khaled Issa, the UAE national team goalkeeper, he described the confrontation as “cold and with a purely Gulf character,” noting that the team began to acquire clear features under the leadership of Dalic. He said: “We now have an identity for the team, and I believe that the future is promising with coach Zlatko, and we achieved satisfactory results with him even though he did not complete a month with the team.”
The Saudi team has not conceded a goal yet, while the Emirati team has conceded a single goal, so the small details seem likely to play the biggest role in determining the identity of the champion, especially with the two teams reaching the final after two campaigns characterized by defensive discipline and stability in the results.
The confrontation also holds another race with years of waiting. Saudi Arabia is searching for its fourth title. The first since 2003, while the UAE wants its third title. The first since 2013.
More than two decades after the last Saudi joy in the Gulf Cup, and 13 years after the last Emirati coronation, Al-Enmaa Stadium will be the scene of a final stop in which there is no room for compensation. Saudi Arabia has an opportunity to regain a long-awaited title among its fans, and the Emirates has an opportunity to start the Dalic era with a new title.
The story began in Riyadh with four Saudi goals in 1972, and after 54 years, the Gulf competition between Saudi Arabia and the Emirates reaches a point that their previous confrontations have not known with such weight, when the two teams meet in Jeddah for the title of “Gulf 27”, in a confrontation that bears the number 19 in the history of their Gulf Cup meetings. Since the Emirati team entered the tournament for the first time in the second edition hosted by Saudi Arabia in 1972, the “Green” and “White” teams have met 18 times, and the Saudi team imposed a clear advantage by achieving 11 victories, compared to three victories for the Emirates, while four matches ended in a draw.
The Saudi advantage also appears in the language of goals, as “Green” scored 28 goals against the Emirati net, compared to 11 goals for “White,” which means that 39 goals were scored during more than half a century of confrontations between the two teams in the Gulf Championship.
Riyadh was the scene of the beginning of the story, when the first confrontation ended with Saudi Arabia winning 4-0, before the “Green” advantage continued during the seventies. The UAE waited until “Gulf 6” in 1982 to record its first victory over Saudi Arabia with an unanswered goal, before the Saudi team returned and excelled in the next edition.
During the nineties, the confrontation entered a more competitive phase as the levels converged, and victories and draws were numerous between the two teams, before the competition moved into the new millennium, where they met in “Gulf 15” in Saudi Arabia in 2002, then “Gulf 16” in Kuwait in 2003.
In “Gulf 18” in 2007, the UAE achieved one of its three victories over Saudi Arabia in the tournament’s history on home soil, before “Al-Akhdar” responded with two successive victories in the next two editions, “Gulf 19” and “Gulf 20.”
“Gulf 23” in Kuwait in 2017 witnessed the last meeting between the two teams in the tournament before the Jeddah date, and the match ended in a goalless draw, making the confrontation absent from the following editions before returning nine years later at a completely different station. The old numbers do not award any points in the final, but they reveal the amount of history behind the two teams. Saudi Arabia is entering the nineteenth confrontation in search of its fourth title, and ending an ongoing wait since its last coronation in 2003, while the UAE is chasing its third title, and its first since the 2013 edition.
Thus, the story moves from Riyadh to Jeddah, and between the two cities, 54 years, 18 confrontations, 39 goals, and successive generations wore the green and white shirts. As for the nineteenth confrontation, it will not be just a new number added to the record; Because at the end of it, one of the two teams will write the most important page in the history of their Gulf confrontations, and lift the “Gulf 27” Cup.
