Al Ahli beat Al Rayyan 3-2 in Round 5 (Group A) of the 2024-2025 season QSL Cup at the Abdullah Bin Khalifa Stadium of Al Duhail club on Sunday, November 10, 2024.

The crucial win saw Al Ahli secure a place in the quarterfinals of the tournament as being one of the four top teams from the group. Al Ahli and Al Rayyan both finished the group stage with seven points apiece. Al Duhail and Al Arabi (both on 10 points) took the top two spots, while Qatar SC (three) and Al Shahania (two) missed the bus.

Erik Exposito (11th minute penalty), Mohammed Emad (67th minute) and Matej Mitrovic (75th minute) scored the goals for Al Ahli, while for Al Rayyan Tameem Mansour Al Abdulla (24th minute) and Abdulrahman Al Harazi (37th minute) were on target.

The absorbing contest saw a lot of action and many hits and misses.

Al Rayyan were unlucky on two occasions when their star midfielder Rodrigo Tabata shook the woodwork. First was in the ninth minute when the Brazilian hit the right post with a powerful kick and the second in the 17th minute when his free-kick (from about five yards away from the box) rattled the crossbar on the left.

Al Ahli hit back soon after Tabata’s first attempt and when on charge Expositio was felled just inside the box by a back leg tangle of Al Rayyan’s Hussain Ali Bahzad. The referee immediately called for a penalty and Exposito struck coolly with his left-footed shot finding the left corner.

Al Rayyan soon equalized with Tameem Al Abdulla seizing on a rebound off Al Ahli’s goalkeeper Yazan Naim’s chest after Tameem Al Abdulla had sized up a long drive.

The Lions then went up the lead as Al Harazi made the most of a golden pass from Khaled Ali Binsabaa as he broke past a parallel defence line to score (2-1).

In the second session, Al Ahli kept attacking and the young Younes Hussein Abdelrahman was the pivot creating some fine opening inside the rival danger zone.

Their efforts bore fruits a little after an hour when an Expositio strike was punched away by Al Rayyan goalkeeper Samy Beldi, but the ball went to Mohammed  Emad who did the needful to make the score 2-2.

Nine minutes later, Al Ahli got their most important winning goal as Mitrovic deflected in a fine corner kick from Younes Hussein (3-2).

In the 80th minute, Al Rayyan had another shy at the rival goal as Tabata made a strike which was pushed out by the goalkeeper, but the ball was still in play and alert defenders of The Brigadiers cleared it away.