Al Sadd finally cracked their Qatar Cup bad luck yesterday, winning the tournament for the first-ever time with a 2-1 win over El Jaish at the Al Sadd Stadium.
The victory came as sweet revenge for Al Sadd, who were knocked out by no other than El Jaish in the semi-final of the 2016 edition.
Al Sadd’s two Algerian stars, Baghdad Bouedjah and Jugurtha Hamroun, scored a goal each on either side of the break while Uzbek international Sardor Rashidov netted the lone goal for El Jaish.
The victory came under the captaincy of Spain and Barcelona legend Xavi Hernandez; this is also Al Sadd’s first piece of silverware in Qatar since Xavi joined the club in 2015.
Xavi came close to scoring in the match, but his close-range effort could not beat El Jaish goalkeeper Ababacar.
On the other hand, there was despair for El Jaish who will be disbanded as an individual entity and merged with Lekhwiya from next season, something which has not gone down too well with their players.