The Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya SC–Al-Minaa SC rivalry, sometimes referred to as Al-Araqa Derby,[1][2] is a high-level competition between the two oldest established clubs in the history of Iraqi football clubs Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya and Al-Minaa (the two teams were founded in 1931). It is considered one of the largest matches in Iraqi football in terms of the number of spectators. Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya is considered among the four biggest clubs in Baghdad, the capital,[3] while Al-Minaa, located in Basra in southern Iraq, is considered one of the biggest and most popular teams in the south, and is the first team that was able to obtain the league title from outside Baghdad.[4]
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Al-Araqa derby
The GCPI director shakes hands with Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya and ِAl-Minaa players before the start of the match at Basra in 1954. The match ended in a 1–1 draw.
The two teams had previously played against each other in 1950s and 1960s in friendly games before the national league was established in 1973, and their matches were characterized by excitement.[5]
One of the historical precedents for this derby is that the first time a scoreboard was placed for Al-Shaab Stadium on 21 March 1977, was in this derby match, which ended with a score of 2–2 and the first to score in the match was Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya player Saleem Malakh.[6]
In the 2004–05 season in Premier League, the teams were divided into groups, and the two teams reached the final match at Al-Shaab Stadium in Baghdad to determine the title, in which Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya won 2–0 to become champions, with Al-Minaa finishing in second place.[7][8] Consequently, the two teams played in the 2006 AFC Champions League as Iraq's representatives in the tournament.[9]
The first official match between the two clubs was a National First Division match in the 1973–74 season and resulted in a 2–0 victory for Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya. The first match in the Premier League was in the 1975–76 season where Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya (known as Al-Tayaran at the time) won 1–0 with a goal scored by the player Hanoon Mashkoor, while Ali Abdul Zahra scored the first goal for Al-Minaa against Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya in the second match of the same season, which ended in a 1–1 draw.[10]
The player who scored the most in the league was Hammadi Ahmed, who scored 10 goals for Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya against Al-Minaa, while Jalil Hanoon scored the most for Al-Minaa against Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya in the league, as he scored 8 goals. Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya scored 106 goals in the league, while Al-Minaa scored 65 goals. The biggest victory was a 6–0 victory for Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya in the 1998–99 season at Al-Shaab Stadium. The highest number of goals in one match recorded was 6–3 in favor of Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya in the 1983–84 season at Al-Shaab Stadium and 5–4 in favor of Al-Minaa in the 1994–95 season at Al-Shaab Stadium too.[11]
One of the most beautiful goals in this derby was the winning goal scored by Hamza Adnan against Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya at Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya Stadium in 30 September 2015, which came from a free kick from a distance from the goal in stoppage time. The match ended with Al-Minaa winning 1–2.[12]
This article uses material from the Wikipedia article Al-Araqa_derby, and is written by contributors.
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