Al Khaleej stun Al Hilal in five-goal thriller | OneFootball

A third consecutive brace from forward Abdullah Al Salam and a late tap-in from veteran Fabio Martins secured a famous victory for Al Khaleej at the expense of defending champions Al Hilal at Prince Mohammed bin Fahd Stadium on Saturday.

Led by former Al Hilal boss Geogios Donis, high-flying Al Khaleej became the first team to defeat Al Hilal in the Roshn Saudi League since May 2022 when the four-time continental champions lost to Al Adalah at the end of the 2022-23 season. Since then, Al Hilal went on a 46-match unbeaten run in the league in a period that saw them reach a world-record 34 consecutive wins in all competitions.

A decade after managing the capital club to the AFC Champions League final, Donis delivered the impossible task with an Al Khaleej side that had only managed to collect one point from 14 previous RSL encounters against Al Hilal.

In front of 17,150 fans in Dammam, it looked like yet another routine victory for Al Hilal who had won nine of their last ten matches in the competition and were in the lead inside 12 minutes thanks to Marcos Leonardo who took advantage of a defensive mistake to put his side in front. Sergej Milinkovic-Savic dispossessed Al Khaleej’s defensive midfielder Khalid Al Sumairi deep into his own half and fed the ball to Leonardo who applied a composed finish with his left into the back of the net.

The visitors’ lead was doubled in the 37th minute when skipper Salem Al Dawsari, returning from an injury, whipped a cross from the corner towards the first post where it was met by a powerful Aleksandar Mitrovic header. The former Fulham man extended his lead as the competition’s top scorer with his 12th goal of the season.

All seemed to be going Al Hilal’s way heading into the break but the turning point came when Kalidou Koulibaly tripped left-back Pedro Rebocho inside the box, prompting the referee to point to the spot and award Al Khaleej a penalty that was taken by Konstantinos Fortounis and saved by goalkeeper Yassine Bono but fell to Al Salem who swept home to give Al Khaleej a glimmer of hope.

The yellow and green side picked up right where they left off after the restart and Al Salem was once more the hero. Already the highest scoring Saudi player in the competition, the 31-year-old secured his third consecutive double and his seventh of the campaign, drawing level with Cristiano Ronaldo after receiving Khaled Narey’s pass and finishing with aplomb to bring the game level two minutes into the second half.

Al Khaleej’s incredible comeback was sealed in the 85th minute thanks to another Narey assist. The Togolese winger broke free and squared for veteran Fabio Martins who was left with the simplest of tasks, tapping in from eight yards to the jubilation of the home crowd and the stunned looks of Al Hilal players and staff.

A club-record fourth consecutive win hauls Al Khaleej into sixth place with 19 points, ahead of Al Ahli and just three points behind Al Nassr in third, Al Shabab in fourth and their next opponents, Al Qadsiah in fifth.

Meanwhile, Al Hilal’s first league defeat in 551 days means they could lose the top spot to Al Ittihad if Karim Benzema and company manage to defeat bottom-of-the-table Al Fateh on Sunday evening.