The saudi FA cup is a tournament played at the start of the soccer season here in saudi. teams from the premier leage are placed into two groups, the the winners play the reunners up, then the final show down for the cup. This year we find that by "chance" the groups are split so that westren region teams (Ittihad, and AL-Ahly) gets very easy way into the final knock out stages, while the other group houses (Al-Nasser, Al-Hillal, Al-Shabab) along with other strong sides from the eastren region. I have no objection to the way the groups came to be since it there was a "draw" and what happend happend... Ittihad is leaving nothing to chance, they won their first match 8:1, and there second match 7:1!!. All that with a temp coach (former NT right back Saleh Khalifah). The main reasone behind this is that Ittihad players (must be under 23, except for 3 players) are experianced, and also because ittihad met easy teams with very unexperianced 23 year old players. The match to watch is between Al-Ahly, and Ittihad, I'm sure Al-Ahly will give their rivals a run fro their money.
Ittihad did it gain, they just beat Alnajmah 8:2. Ittihad is setting the stage up for a great match against their Jeddah rivals Alahly.
The three matches were played against easy teams. Ittihad match against Al-Ahly will show Ittihad true strength. The league will be played well after the tournament is over, at that time the SAUDI NT will be playing in the Arab cup, the gulf cup, and asian cup qualifiers all those tournaments will suck the air out of ittihad fire since as usual the best players will be playing for the NT. So I guess we will have to wait and see.