by Danotzki Santos
Doha: The 14th season of the Emir Cup basketball reels off tonight at the Al Gharafa Indoor Arena, with Al Arabi taking on Al Gharafa in the opener followed by the match between Al Wakra and Qatar Sports Club.
This year’s Emir Cup starts with the preliminary round with the nine clubs divided into two groups.
Group 1 consisting of defending champions Al Sadd, Heir Apparent Cup runners-up Eljaish, Al Ahli and league new comers Al Shamal, while in Group 2 are newly-crowned Heir Apparent Cup winners Al Rayyan, hosts Al Gharafa, Al Arabi, Al Wakra and Qatar Sports Club.
The teams in each group play each other in a single-round round-robin, with the top team advancing to the semi-final stage outright, while the second and third-ranked teams go through the quarter-final stage.
The quarter-finals will be cross-over knock-out matches, one pairing the second ranked team in Group 1 with the third placed team in Group 2 and the other having the second ranked team in Group 2 meet the thirdbest in Group 1.
The penultimate stage will be a pair of best-of-three tussles, between the top finishers in the preliminaries and the survivors in the quarter-final showdowns, to determine the final contenders to the most prestigious basketball title in the kingdom.
The current Heir Apparent Cup champions Al Rayyan, have figured in all but one of the past thirteen Emir Basketball Cup championships, winning seven of them and getting runners-up honours five times in the history of the tournament.
Like former Emir Cup champions Al Gharafa and Qatar Club, defending champions Al Sadd have won the title twice, their first was garnered in 2004 against Al Rayyan whom they also beat last year.The Peninsula
