Gharafa hold leaders Duhail
Doha: After bulldozing their way past most of the opponents so far, Al Duhail met their match in Al Gharafa, who held them to a 1-1 draw on Saturday.
It was a great comeback for Gharafa, who had lost to Al Kharaitiyat 1-4 in their previous match. They remain sixth in the table with six points while Duhail, who was surprisingly off colour on Saturday, lead the table with 16.
After a cagey start, Youssef El Arabi opened the scoring for Duhail with a beautifully-worked team goal.
Luiz Martin picked Nam Tae-Hee’s run through the inside right channel with a perfect pass and the Korean forward controlled the ball on his run before providing it on a platter for El Arabi, who slotted it into the open net and celebrated in customary style.
Gharafa’s only clear-cut chance of the first half went to Amro Abdulfattah, but he hit his back volley straight at Duhail goalkeeper Khalifa Ababacar.
Abdulfattah’s endeavour again posed problems for Duhail at the start of the second half when he found Luis Jimenez after a surging run inside the box, but the Gharafa captain scuffed his shot when he had only the keeper to beat.
Nonetheless, Gharafa did not have to wait for long to get the goal they were looking for and it came in the 56th minute.
Vladimir Weiss made a surging run on the right and cut the ball back for Jiminez who, however, could only rattle the bar with a rasping shot.
But Abdulfattah was in the right place at the right time and he calmly slotted the ball past Ababacar.
Gharafa again threatened, mainly through Weiss and Abdulfattah, but Ababacar came to Duhail’s rescue.
At the other end, Qasem Burhan made a fine stop to deny Youssef Msakni. The Tunisian forward got another big chance to win the game for Duhail, but he hit the post with his right-footer after dribbling past the keeper.
Duhail brought in Mohammed Muntari for Almoez Ali and Murad Naji for Ismail Mohammad in the second half in search of a winner, but it was just not their day.
