Basketball title cheers Qatar

Doha Riding on the morale-boosting victory over three-times defending champion Egypt, hosts Qatar registered an impressive 78-70 victory over Jordan to clinch the men’s basketball gold at the Arab Games yesterday.The hosts went all out right from the start and once they got their noses in front, never let things slip. Such was their authority over the proceedings that it was only once, in the early stages of the match, that they trailed by a margin of two points. Qatar went into the half hour mark with a three-point advantage (33-30).Later they were all over the rival territory and at one stage, the lead was widened to nine points (50-41). Maintaining their dominance and egged on by a vocal local crowd, Qatar maintained a stranglehold on the game and the scoreboard read 67-57 in their favour as the clock ticked towards the final 10 minutes.Jordan then again showed their tremendous fighting qualities to almost script a dramatic comeback and the margin was reduced to 69-65.However, the Qatari camp got their act together quickly to regain momentum and managed eight points in a row to seal a memorable victory.“It feels great, so great. And to win it at home, in front of these fans, was amazing,” said an overjoyed Saad Abdulrahman.“We were better focused than our last game, especially on defence.From the beginning of the game, we controlled the game. We were focused on getting the gold medal, especially with so many fans showing up to support us,” said Qatar coach Qusay Khalaf.Jordan’s American coach Thomas Baldwin was understandably disappointed to settle for the silver having come this far.“We don’t like silver. This is our second one this year. We lost against China in the finals at the Asian Games. We are struggling. We are not happy. I really feel sorry for all the guys. It is no fun to get silver,” said Baldwin.Egypt claimed the bronze beating Tunisia 88-71. Qatar, however, missed out on the volleyball title after losing out to Egypt in straight games 25-20, 25-20, 25-10 in the final. Thus, Egypt completed a grand double as both their men’s and women’s teams emerged victorious in the volleyball event.Earlier, Algeria won the bronze medal after beating Kuwait 3-0 (25-23, 25-17, 26-24).The remaining two golds of the day for Qatar came in women’s shooting event. Mesaad Amna al-Abdulla with a total of 86 points clinched gold for Qatar in the women’s trap shooting final at Lusail Shooting Complex. The silver went to Ray Bassil with 83 points while Shahad al-Hawal with 67 points claimed bronze.Later, al-Abdulla teaming up with Essa Noora al-Ali and Hassan Nawal al-Khalaf put up a grand total of 195 to clinch gold in the trap shooting team final. Morocco’s Hind Amani, Yasmina Mesfioui and Yasmine Marirhi claimed silver with 188 points, while Kuwaits Shahad al-Hawal, Sarah al-Hawal, Sumaiah Juhail with 185 points bagged bronze. These double gold allowed Qatar to overtake Saudi Arabia in the shooting medal tally.“The team competition was really strong between us and Morocco. In the individual final I was really afraid of the Lebanese girl Bassil because she came from fourth and was competing with me for the gold.“Thanks to God for winning the individual and the team gold. I practised a lot and I nailed it,” said a visibly pleased al-Abdulla after the match.Qatar claimed the bronze medal in snooker team as Ali al-Obaidly, Ahmed Saif and Mohsen Bukshaisha beat Iraq’s Abd Ali Mohsin and Firas al-Shamini 3-1 at the Qatar Billiards and Snooker Federation.