Al Jazeera seeks the UAE Challenge Cup title

At eight o’clock in the evening today, Al Jazira will play an important confrontation when it meets Al-Ahly of Qatar for the Challenge Cup title at the end of the series of UAE-Qatari Super Cup matches, at Mohammed bin Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi, where “Abu Dhabi Pride” aims to revive its season by winning the title.

Al Jazira hopes to join the list of UAE clubs that have won the title, which are Shabab Al Ahly twice, Al Wahda twice, and one title for each of the Sharjah, Al Wasl and Al Nasr clubs, while winning the cup is a morale boost for the team during the second half of the season.

Al Jazira team is not experiencing its best period in the ADNOC Professional League, as it occupies fifth place with 21 points from 13 matches, scoring 18 goals and conceding 12, which contributed to its staying away from competing for the title directly. It was also eliminated from the Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank Cup, in the quarter-finals after facing Al Wahda team, where it lost the first leg with a score of 3-0, and won the return match 1-0, but that was not enough to exceed the aggregate of the two matches and qualify for the semi-finals. To end their career in this tournament, while at the President’s Cup level, Al Jazira qualified for the quarter-finals after defeating the Ajman team in the round of 16.

Despite the technical change made by the football company by dismissing Moroccan coach Hussein Amouta and appointing Dutchman Marino Bosic, the team achieved mixed results despite the great potential it possesses and the presence of players with experiences that are considered among the most prominent in the league, such as Frenchman Nabil Fekir and Egyptian Mohamed Elneny.

On the other hand, the situation does not disappear for Al-Ahly of Qatar, which occupies ninth place in the local league with 15 points, after losing last Friday to Al-Sadd with two unanswered goals in the 13th round of the competition, and then losing last Monday in the Qatar Cup to Al-Sailiya with two goals to one.

The team is led by veteran Qatari coach Younis Ali, and Qatari Al-Ahly has a diverse group of local and foreign players, most notably goalkeeper Yazan Naeem and defender Matej Mitrovic, who adds defensive solidity, and midfielder Idris Fetohi, who has great experience and the ability to control the tempo of the game. As for the offensive line, the player Julian Draxler, who has international experience, stands out, in addition to Eric Exposito and striker Omar Sekou.