Doha: Watching Qatar Stars League (QSL) matches is turning out to be profitable exercise for many football fans in Qatar, thanks to the QSL prize draw for spectators.
Over the last four weeks quite a few spectators have had their dreams fulfilled at the weekly lucky dip for QSL ticket holders, winning cars and other goodies.
Owning a new car that’s a dream many has nurtured since childhood. Yesterday, at Al Bidda Tower, the new home of QSL, it was the turn of Lionel Messi fan Mohammad Omar Faruque Rahman to own a new car.
Rahman, a native of Hatiya, a small Island in Bangladesh, 350 kilometres away from capital Dhaka, won a Toyota Yaris at the QSL draw. The 30-year-old, living in Qatar for the last two years, had bought a ticket for Al Arabi-Qatar SC match played on October 20 at Grand Hamad Stadium.
According to QSL, the prize draw takes place at the end of each of the six QSL matches in each round and produces two ticket winners per match. Thus, each QSL round offers 12 prizes.
“I am delighted to win a car. It is a nice vacation gift for me. I am leaving for Bangladesh in December. I did not own a car and so I did not take a driving licence, but after I return from my vacation I will join the driving classes,” said Rahman, who works for Qatar Navigation as a Technician. Rahman, who pumped his fists in the air and hugged his financial controller uncle, Atiq Mohammed Rehman, when the lucky number was announced, said they have not decided on ways to celebrate the win. “This is the first time I am winning any prize at any sporting event. I have been attending football matches in Qatar on a regular basis,” disclosed Rahman, who is an Argentina fan.
Rahman, a former village level midfield football player is looking forward to meeting his idol Messi in Qatar.
“Hopefully, I will meet Messi in Qatar. The last time when Messi was here, with the Argentina team to play Brazil (in November 2010), I was working in Bangladesh,” said Rahman.Each week, two lucky winners get to own a luxury car from Toyota. This week, Yousef Obaidan turned out to be the other lucky winner of a Toyota Lexus car. QSL spectators can buy tickets from Virgin Megastores in either Landmark or Villaggio, Souq Waqif or at match venue one hour before kick-off, officials said. Fans can drop their ticket stub into the prize draw box at match venues.
During the match, two ticket stubs are chosen at random and owners of those are announced at the stadium and identified. The holder the winning match ticket must be in attendance at the match in question and present themselves within 30 minutes of final whistle, officials added.
The two ticket winners at each of the six matches are then invited to a weekly prize draw where the 12 prizes are announced.
At the second draw, the 12 winners are in for a chance to win a Toyota car. All prizes are presented to the winning match ticket holder at the second draw.
Yesterday, three of the 12 winners were eliminated as they were not present for the second weekly draw. Besides the Toyota cars, Ipads, Black Berry, Video Camera, E-Machine Laptops were also part of the giveaways for the winners.
The Peninsula
