كتب : Omar Shoeb
Abdul-Mohsen Al-Dawsary, Ahmed Otaif and Nasser Al-Shamrani scored Al-Shabab’s winning goals in the 48th, 51st and 82nd minutes respectively.
Al-Hilal dominated the field throughout the first-half thanks to the excelled versions of Nawaf Al-Tmyat and Mohamed Shalhoub but failed to find the net given the strikers’ failure in making use of the available chances and Al-Shabab goalkeeper Mohamed Khowga’s top-form.
Al-Shabab then went on to take things over into their own hands in the second-half given Hilal players’ fatigue, after playing against Ittihad Jeddah a few days before, and succeeded in carrying out head coach Abdul-Latif Al-Hussaini’s plan of action.
Al-Dawsary opened the score for Al-Shabab from a spot-kick three minutes from restart, before Otaif double the leads another three minutes later.
Al-Shamrani secured Al-Shabab’s victory after going one-on-one with the Al-Hilal goalkeeper only eight minutes from time.
Al-Shabab managed to dethrone Al-Hilal from their title from last season and sabotaged their plan to repeat last season’s scenario of winning the three major Saudi competitions.