Al Ahli right-back Abdulaziz Haikal has ended speculation about his future after he joined UAE team-mates Majed Nasser and Abdulaziz Sanqour in signing new contracts with the Arabian Gulf League champions.
Haikal, 26, has developed into one of the division’s premier defenders since being bought from Al Shabab in January 2011. But with his deal entering the final year, rumours had grown about a desire to defect from Rashid Stadium.
This was emphatically put to an end Wednesday, as it was announced the player who has scored twice in 115 top-flight games for the Red Knights had inked fresh terms until 2020. Fellow Whites full-back Abdulaziz Sanqour, 27, has signed on until the same date, with 32-year-old No1 for club and country Majed Nasser agreeing to stay until 2019.
Back-up shot stopper Saif Yousif, 27, has also put pen to paper on an arrangement until 2020.
Meanwhile, struggling Emirates Club have taken the ruthless decision to ditch freshly-acquired Australian centre-back Zac Anderson and bring in Iraq’s Ahmad Ibrahim.
Anderson, 25, has been part of a rearguard which has been breached nine times in the opening pair of 2016/17 AGL games. The Falcons have reacted by purchasing 24-year-old ex-Al Dhafra and Ajman stopper Ibrahim, who will now fulfil the Asian spot in the four-player foreign quota.
Emirates have also sold full-back Alhasan Saleh, 25, to Sharjah.
Elsewhere, the UAE Football Association has punished wild Emirates Club goalkeeper Ali Saqr with a record Dh300,000 fine and two-game suspension after his violent assault on Al Ain’s Danilo Asprilla.
Saqr, 27, snapped during last Thursday’s 5-2 thrashing in the Arabian Gulf League. He first knocked the Colombian winger to the floor with an elbow, before dangerously stamping on his prone victim once a red card was issued.
This egregious incident has forced the governing body’s disciplinary committee to increase by 50 per cent the previous record amount demanded of Al Ahli shot stopper Majed Nasser in November 2014. The UAE No1 was banned for six months and ordered to pay Dh200,000 for spitting at referee Yacoub Al Hamadi, although both rulings were overturned on appeal.