Pre-match: Crown Prince Cup Final 2009: Al-Hilal v. Al-Shabab [R]

Here's where you can talk about the first final of the season, Al-Hilal v. Al-Shabab (Friday 2/27 at 17:20 GMT).

Al-Hilal is topping the league, while Shabab has been unimpressive this season. However, Shabab always step things up in final matches. The last time the two teams met was in November, when Hilal won 2-0, but Shabab were missing at least 4 first-teamers, and have since added Ahmad Ajab and some Qatari guy.

Anyway, I thought I'd add some trivia here: the two teams have played against each other in 8 finals; Hilal has won 5, and Shabab 3. The last final was the 2006 league championship final when Shabab won 3-0.

They've played in the Crown Prince Cup final twice:

1999: Shabab won 1-0 with a goal from Abdullah Al-Sheehan
2000: Hilal won 3-0

Shabab are missing Majed Al-Amri due to injury; Hilal are missing Majed al-Marshadi due to suspension, and two of his potential replacements (Al-Ghannam and Khayrat) are injured.

So, what do you guys think will happen?

The way I see it Shabab are stronger on the flanks with their two fullbacks Shuhail and Hassan Muath. Hilal's fullbacks on the other hand are probably the weakest players in the team.

Shabab's weakness is in central defense, but Hilal's conservative style with 1-striker might limit the effects of this.

I don't know about this one; it's tough to call.

Viva hilal

Where is our resident Shababi (Saudi64)?

its simple hilal will lose this title if they want to win the league and ask shabab to get beaten in the league match,,,

That's really the only reasonable option given the injury of Hassan Khayrat. (if I see Fahad Al-Mfarrej on the field, I'm not watching the game). Al-Ghannam's injury is not helping either because he would have taken Radoi's place in midfield.

Dude stop talking nonsense.

Don't worry about today's match, nasser al shamrani will strike them their worst nightmare! And for the league, shabab will lose but ittihad will win and not hilal!

Wow you've become so anti-Hilali all of a sudden, you even changed your profile from "Foe:Al Ittihad" to "Foe:Al-Hilal." Inshallah you'll see once again how overrated your boy Shamrani is.

shamrani will kill hilal defense.....autef brothers will bury midfield...if naji majrashi substituted in last 10 minutes expect a goal for shabab

what nonsense...its a fact...last year hilal lost prince faisal cup due to this reason only

Fahad Al-Mofarrej is playing!!!

I'm seriously considering switching the TV off and going back to bed. If we lose today because of him, then I want Cosmin fired immediately.

That's because Shabab are mirroring Hilal's 4-5-1, instead of their usual 4-4-2. They're using 3 me7wars

why whats is his problem....cosmin did not have any option...i think so

hope nasser is out with injury...if saudi fa has got sme brains they should cancel some of the league matches of some main teams...they should concentrate on curing the injuries instead of playing...

I was just like you.. he had some mistakes today..
but he scored the winning goal, what a lucky guy

Cosmin is not with the players in the stage?! WTF??!?

Disgraceful how they stopped the coach from joining the players up there.

He almost caused a penalty, but the ref was kind to him. Otherwise, we would have remembered this day as just another typical Exit 17 final. Yallah congratulations to him -- I still don't want to see him in the starting 11 in an important match again.

I didn't think it was boring at all. Maybe the first half was boring because Shabab were being so negative, but the second half and extra-time had a lot of great moments -- classic final, in my opinion.

The problem isn't 4-5-1. Hilal plays 4-2-3-1, and when you have Wilhelmsson, Tayeb, and Al-Fraidi, this can be a very attacking formation, though it makes it easier for the other team to isolate Yasser.

What Shabab and Nassr used was 4-3-2-1, with 3 defensive midfielders. That's actually very effective if you want to stop Al-Hilal from scoring, but as you said, it's hard to score against Al-Hilal (or anyone else) that way. But if you go back to 4-4-2, you open up the field for Hilal's midfielders to start working their magic. Hilal's main weakness is on the flanks and I don't think Shabab tried hard enough to exploit that.

Having said that, this was a very difficult match for Al-Hilal, and it could have gone the other way because Hilal's players seemed to be running on empty after around the 75th minute.

and the jealous fans from other clubs want him punished for that..