Archive | Sports

Al Ahed FC Wins the AFC Cup For Lebanon!

By Rami on November 5, 2019 in Sports

As we go through turbulent times in Lebanon, Al Ahed Football Club became the first Lebanese club to claim the AFC cup after winning 1-0 over DPR Korea’s 4.25 (April 25) club in Kuala Lumpur yesterday.

I personally didn’t watch the game and was following the updates online, but I found the highlights on the AFC website here. Al Ahed missed several chances before Issa Yakobo scored the winner in the 74th minute.

The fact that Korea’s April 25 club is backed by the North Korean army while Al Ahed is linked to Hezbollah, of course made it interesting enough for some international websites/newspapers to be highlighted in their headlines like these two below.

Original article here

Anyway, congratulations to Lebanon, and here’s a video of the champions celebrating their win at the end of the game. To note that goalkeeper Mahdi Khalil was named the MVP of the tournament while the team also got the fair play award.

Formula 1 Races Are Now Free to Watch on MBC Action

By Rami on March 23, 2019 in Sports, Television

In case you didn’t know it yet, Formula 1 is now free-to-air in our region since MBC Group acquired the exclusive broadcast rights until 2023. The 21 races along with all practice sessions and qualifications will be free to watch live on MBC Action.

The rights were previously held by beIN Sports which I never had at home, so I’ve been missing the Grand Prix’s for several years now even though I have been a avid follower since 1997 when Nadim Mhanna used to comment on the races on LBC. The only problem though with being a returning fan after all these year is getting familiar with the new faces and all the regulation changes. And even though the opening race took place last week, I think the best way to warm up for the coming ones is by watching a new documentary on Netflix called “Formula 1: Drive to Survive”, which summarizes in 10 episodes everything that happened during the last season with a lot of interviews with the major key players in the championship.

So, here’s to an exciting season, and hoping Ferrari prevails this year!

2019 AFC Asian Cup Starts Today – Good Luck to Lebanon!

By Rami on January 5, 2019 in Lebanon, Sports

The AFC Asian Cup starts today in the United Arab Emirates, and football fans throughout Lebanon will be rooting for the national team to hopefully advance to the knockout stage!

Our first and only participation in the tournament dates back to the year 2000. Back then, we were automatically qualified since we were hosting the event, so this this counts as the first time we make it to the tournament with our own effort (bear in mind that the 2019 tournament was be expanded from 16 teams to 24 teams).

In Group E, Lebanon will be facing Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and North Korea, and our matches schedule will be as follows (all in our local time):

Lebanon Vs. Qatar – Wednesday January 9th at 6:00PM
Lebanon Vs. Saudi Arabia – Saturday January 12th at 6:00PM
Lebanon Vs. North Korea – Thursday January 17th at 6:00PM

You can of course watch the games on biIN Sports channels, and Télé Liban seems to have bought broadcasting rights but I have no idea for how many matches.

So until our first game against Qatar, here’s to Lebanon making good results and hopefully advancing to the next stages. Good luck to the Cedars!

FC Barcelona Legends VS Real Madrid Leyendas in Beirut – Full Match Highlights

By Rami on April 30, 2017 in Sports

Barcelona won a second Clasico within a week on Friday but this time when their legends team beat the Real Madrid legends 3-2 at Camille Chamoun Sports City Stadium in Beirut.

Barcelona legends were led by Ronaldinho, and even though he didn’t score, he showed he still got the magic with three assists in the game. Giuly scored twice for Barcelona and Simao also scored a goal, while Fernando Sanz and Javi Guerrero scored for Real Madrid.

The game was broadcasted live on MTV, and for those who missed you can still check the highlights as posted on FC Barcelona’s YouTube channel.

On a side, the game was very well organized and security forces were all around the Sports City Stadium to ensure it goes smoothly. If only we see the same energy put by the Lebanese Football Association to make the Lebanese league more interesting to watch and follow!

Alex Demirdjian & The Lebanon Team Ranked First in Their Category at Monza

By Rami on April 23, 2017 in Cars, Sports

The Blancpain GT Series Endurance race took place today at Monza and Alex Demirdjian along with his Lebanon team (Abigail Eaton and Davide Rizzo) did a fantastic job aboard the Ferrari 488 GT3 and ranked first in the AM Cup category!! (You can check the results here)

It’s also a job very well done by DEMCO Properties who chose to race under the name of Lebanon with the slogan “Lebanon is Calling” and branded the team in red.

A friend of mine was at the circuit throughout the day and sent me the below photos which I thought of sharing here.

Lebanese Alex Demirdjian is Competing in a 3 Hours Endurance Race at Monza

By Rami on April 21, 2017 in Racing, Sports

As part of the Blancpain GT Series Endurance Cup, Lebanese driver Alex Demirdjian (also CEO of Demco Steel) along with two other team mates is competing this weekend April 22nd and 23rd in the second round of the series, the TM Performance 3 Hours of Monza, which is an endurance race that will be held at Monza circuit in Italy.

A total of 53 teams will be participating and Alex will be competing aboard a Ferrari 488 GT3 with the “Lebanon is calling” slogan all over it.

A friend will be attending the event and promised to try to send me some photos and I will definitely be sharing them here if she did. In all cases, let’s all cross our fingers for Alex!

Ronaldinho is in Beirut!

By Rami on January 31, 2017 in Sports

I just spotted a tweet by Ronaldinho posted a few hours ago stating he’s in Beirut with a photo of himself in Zaitunay Bay.

I didn’t find any accurate details about the purpose of his visit anywhere on the web, but let’s hope he’s negotiating playing a game in Lebanon along with other football legends like the one that took place at Fouad Chehab stadium last summer.

P.S: I hope people stop posting jokes about him signing for Al Ahed because they’re so lame!

Update:

Here are some more photos courtesy of a friend of mine.

Cool 350Z Drift Video at Beirut Harbour

By Rami on May 29, 2016 in Automotive, Sports

xavier massaad beirut harbour drift

I just saw this video of Xavier Massaad drifting a Nissan 350Z at Beirut Harbour and thought it’s worth sharing.

I’m not really sure when was it video shot, but Xaview definitely pulled some cool moves and aside from the ones made by Abdo Feghaly we rarely get any good drifting videos here.

Red Bull RB7 Meets Byblos and The Cedars of God

By Rami on May 23, 2016 in Photography, Racing, Sports

For all of us who have never attended a Fromula 1 race yet, Red Bull made it up by bringing Carlos Sainz Jr. to burn some rubber in his RB7 racing cat at Beirut Waterfront. The event was unfortunately a bit dull for me as I couldn’t attend and watched it on TV instead which sometimes doesn’t give you a sense of how fast the car was going. I hope some professional videos will soon be available online, including some shots from an onboard camera would be cool too!

Anyway, well before the event, the Red Bull team took the RB7 for a photo shoot around Byblos and the Cedars of God. I found this set of resultant photos on motorsport.com and thought of sharing them here because they’re pretty cool.

I couldn’t find the name of the photographer by the way, so if anyone knows it please leave a comment to credit him/her properly.

On Tripoli’s New Bike Lane

By Rami on May 20, 2016 in Sports, Tripoli

I really hate to be a party pooper, but as I much as I like the city of Tripoli and love spending time there, I didn’t feel much excited about that new bike near the International Fair.

To start with, I personally love biking and I imagine a ride across Tripoli would be so fun to do since it’s a relatively small city with many interesting places to see, without forgetting the tasty stuff you’ll find whether from food and drink carts or small shops everywhere.

That being said, the initiative of introducing a bike lane sounds like a pretty good move and I hope it gets implemented in other areas around the city as well. But before we all get hyped can we question whether people will actually respect it or not?

Lebanese drivers barely acknowledge the existence of white lines on the road, and I don’t think an additional yellow one will make any difference
Whether designated to be place for cars to park or not, the right side of any street here is taken for granted as a parking space. It’s more like an unspoken driving rule and chances are cars will soon be parked all over that yellow line.
Moreover, even if we manage to clear that space exclusively for bikers, we will never be able to convince taxi drivers to stop using it to pick up passengers.

So yes basically unless we start respect the basic driving rules in Lebanon I see the new line totally useless. Until then, ride safely!