Gulf Cup still has weight in the region

Qatar's Khaled Maftouf, right, and Abdel Karim Fadlalla celebrate with the national flag after defeating Saudi Arabia 2-1 in the final of the 22nd Gulf Cup football match at the King Fahad stadium in Riyadh, on November 26, 2014. Fayez Nureldine / AFPShow less

The scenes at the final whistle told their own story: ecstatic Qatari players climbing fences to celebrate with their fans.

The message from Riyadh was clear – for all its troubles, the Gulf Cup of Nations still matters.

After television broadcasting rights disputes, the timing of the tournament, low attendances and bickering between the heads of the individual federations, the 2014 Gulf Cup began under a cloud and the future of the competition was being questioned.

Wednesday's wonderful final between hosts Saudi Arabia and Qatar will not whitewash all of these issues, but it provided a timely reminder that the competition that has run since 1970 is all about the football.

For all the talk of brotherhood among the eight nations that contest the Gulf Cup, the players and fans still love nothing more than getting one over their neighbours.

Beyond the bragging rights, though, are far more pragmatic reason for persevering with this competition.

It provides a genuine opportunity of winning silverware that, frankly, most of the teams are unlikely to get anywhere else at present

Seven of the eight teams that took part, Yemen being the exception, will take part in the Asian Cup in Australia in January.

It is hard to see any of them winning the title.

In Riyadh a tournament that started at snail’s pace was transformed when the last four teams could sniff glory.

Both semi-finals, particularly Saudi Arabia’s 3-2 win over the UAE, provided excellent football and entertainment.

In the final, Saudi and Qatar produced arguably the best match of the tournament.

It may come across as empty rhetoric sometimes, but the Gulf Cup has been a stepping stone for the region’s teams.

The ultra-successful Kuwait and Iraq teams of the mid-1970s to mid-1980s excelled at the Gulf Cup before dominating the continent and qualifying to the 1982 and 1986 World Cups respectively.

So did Saudi Arabia, who endured years of disappointment, and slow progress, at Gulf Cup level before their two Asian Cup triumphs in the 1980s and four consecutive World Cup appearances between 1994 and 2006.

The UAE only began to find their feet at the 1982 Gulf Cup in Abu Dhabi before steadily improving throughout the decade.

Inspired by the runners-up spot at the 1988 Gulf Cup, a year later they went on to qualify for the 1990 World Cup in Italy.

The development of Oman and Bahrain, who alongside the UAE were the whipping boys of the competition in its early years, was accelerated by the frequency of the Gulf Cup.

Yemen, who only joined the party in 2002, are starting to reap the benefits, too.

They may not have scored a goal in Saudi, but two draws against Bahrain and eventual champions Qatar, a narrow loss to the hosts and an attacking, albeit often naive, brand of football, saw them win the hearts of fans across the Gulf.

The Gulf Cup cannot take all the credit, though, as there are Asian Cup and World Cup qualifying tournaments, as well as Olympic and age group competitions.

Still, rather than a few chastising defeats in the early stages of these campaigns, teams such as Yemen can count on regular tournament experience every two years.

It is hard to argue that the Gulf Cup remains as relevant as it was in previous decades.

With domestic competitions and the Asian Champions League receiving so much exposure, the tournament has lost some of its prestige.

Yet it continues to be relevant: to the federations, the players and, most of all, to the fans.

The UAE’s victory in the 2007 Gulf Cup in Abu Dhabi was celebrated as wildly as qualification to the World Cup would be.

It was the success of Mahdi Ali’s team in Bahrain last year that has inspired talk of a group of players with hopes of progressing deep into the knockout stages at Australia 2015 before attempting to reach the 2018 World Cup in Russia.

To those involved, it is more than just a stepping stone to bigger things.

The reaction of the Emirati players after their semi-final loss and the Qatari’s after their final triumph, show that, once it comes around, the Gulf Cup is a competition worth winning on its own merits.

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