Al Nasr fans celebrating after winning the Prince Faisal Cup this year. The Riyadh club defeated derby foes Al Hilal for the title.

By R. Ravi Kumar

Al Nasr’s trophy cabinet may be creaking under the weight of six Saudi League titles and seven Cups but the fact remains that it was locked for a long time in the recent past until they scooped a minor piece of silverware last year.

The Prince Faisal Cup is arguably a secondary accolade in the impressive list of Al Nasr’s achievements but sits right up there for the club’s faithful.

Not the least because the Knights of Najd kick-started their revival by taming their archrivals from across Riyadh, the famous Al Hilal, to bring it home - sufficient salve for four agonising years without any trophy.

The storied rivalry between Al Nasr and Al Hilal dates back to the fifties when the two clubs were formed, and over the years fans have banked on it for scintillating and sublime football, besides the talking points.

Al Hilal are by far the winningest club in Saudi football history with an envious record which lists, among others, 11 league titles and 12 Cups.

Last season, Al Hilal defeated Jeddah rivals Al Ittihad for the league title and also won the Crown Prince Cup. On the other hand, 2007 proved to be a comeback year for their derby opponents Al Nasr who were almost relegated in 2006-07.

While both call the magnificent King Fahd Stadium their own, Al Nasr retreat to the 30,000-seater Prince Faisal Bin Fahd Stadium for their training sessions.

Al Hilal won last season’s bragging rights by defeating Al Nasr twice in the league but the latter had the last laugh by clinching the Prince Faisal Cup.

The only time they have crossed swords in a league championship final was in 1994-95 when Al Nasr clinched the honours 3-1, a victory which is now part of the club’s folklore.


The Jeddah derby

Approximately a thousand kilometers to the west of Riyadh, on the coast of the Red Sea, is the bustling metropolis of Jeddah, which serves as the setting for the decades-old but thriving rivalry of Al Ittihad and Al Ahli.

Their first ever meeting in 1937 - recorded as a draw - clearly had the effect of leaving the Jeddah foes in a state of perpetual warfare with both battling for supremacy.

Since then the two have locked horns at least four times in league finals, with each winning twice.

Al Ittihad beat Al Ahli for back-to-back titles in 1998-99 and the year after, before scalping their cross-city opponents in the 2000-01 semi-finals en route to only the second hat-trick in Saudi league history after Al Shabab. In 2002-03, Al Ittihad again ran the rule over Al Ahli for the crown.

In Al Ahli’s records, 1978 and 1983-84 are circled as golden years when they overcame Al Ittihad for their two titles till date in a round-robin system. Out of Al Ahli’s 10 King’s Cup titles, one was wrested by defeating their adversaries in the final of the 1978-79 edition.

But Al Ittihad, who play at the Prince Abdullah Bin Faisal Stadium, have been the more illustrious of the two, boasting of seven league titles, 10 Cups and two AFC Champions League titles, not to mention dozens of other regional accolades.

Last year, Al Ittihad lost the league title to Al Hilal by a whisker but had the satisfaction of winning the derby and watching Al Ahli finish deep down the table. 

 (Ali Al Hamdani and Samer Jaber contributed to this feature)