El Jaish and Al Gharafa will clash in the final of the Emir Cup basketball tournament after easing past their semi-final opponents yesterday.
While El Jaish thrashed Al Arabi 81-55, Al Gharafa had a relatively tough match against Al Shamal before emerging 94-80 winners.
Their clash on Friday will be the second finals they will be contesting this season after Al Gharafa had won the Qatar Cup earlier. The first tournament of the season, the prestigious Qatar Basketball League, was also too close to call before El Jaish took the honours on the last day of the competition.
Yesterday, Al Arabi were no match for El Jaish who led from the off to secure victory with Leon Macklin scoring a match-high 22 points.
James Davon added 17 and Atif El Hadry and Yousuf Mohamed contributed 10 each for the winners who made a brisk start and were 20-11 after the first quarter.
They went on consolidating as the match progressed and enjoyed a commanding 20-point lead (63-40) at the end of the third quarter that left Al Arabi with little chance of a comeback.
Adamu Saaka scored 15 points for Al Arabi while Osaro Adako was close behind on 14. None of the other Al Arabi players managed to score in the double figures.
El Jaish coach Hatem Mamlouk was pleased with his team’s win and the prospect of winning their second title of the year.
“We are in one more final and we are keen to make that count,” he said. “Had we won the Qatar Cup we could have gone for a treble but that is now past us and now we must focus on beating Al Gharafa on Friday.”
In the second semi-final, Al Gharafa led for almost 36 minutes of the match for their 94-80 win with Sammy Monroe leading the scoring charts with 25 points and Saad Abdulrahman contributing 23.
Monroe only managed a 55 percent field goal conversion success rate and failed to score a single three-pointer.
Abdulrahman, however, scored 15 points from the three point mark from 11 attempts to boost Al Gharafa’s tally at crucial moments.
Michael Taylor, one of Al Gharafa’s stars this season, chipped in with 18 points with a couple of three-pointers while Hassino Ndoye had 13 and Abdelkader Salem 10.
For Al Shamal, Harat Mohamed top-scored with 29 points, followed by Saleh Elhag who excelled with 21.


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