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Kuwait beat Saudi to grab Gulf Cup

ADEN - Kuwait won the Gulf Cup on Sunday, beating Saudi Arabia 1-0 in extra time in a tournament played amid heavy security.

Striker Waleed Aly scored in the 95^th minute to give Kuwait their record 10^th Gulf Cup title. Saudi Arabia were going for their fourth Gulf Cup crown, but were stymied by a stingy Kuwait defense that yielded only two goals all tournament.

Saudi Arabia beat UAE in the semifinal.

Yemeni President Ali Abdullah Saleh, who attended the final, called the staging of the tournament a “political and moral victory for Yemen.”

Saleh handed the Gulf Cup trophy to the Kuwaiti team, while fireworks went off above the 30,000-strong crowd of mostly Yemeni fans. Fans drove cars wrapped in green Kuwait flags through the streets of Aden, honking horns to celebrate their team’s victory.

The tournament opened last month amid tight security in the southern port city of Aden. Some football federations early on had suggested the tournament might not happen because of safety concerns and worries that hotels and football facilities would not be ready.

Dozens of checkpoints were set up across Aden and security forces established three rings of security around the city. Security remained tight throughout the tournament, which went off without incident. A few months ago, a separatist movement in southern Yemen had demanded that the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait and Iraq boycott the competition. The Supreme Council of the Southern Movement said that participating in the 20^th Gulf Cup would lend support to Yemen’s government at a time when “the south is bleeding.”

There are almost daily clashes between the military and suspected al-Qaida gunmen, including an attack by suspected militants last month that killed a security chief of a southern Yemeni town and triggered a series of clashes between soldiers and militants that killed eight people, mostly government troops.

Fears of violence at the tournament had to be taken seriously, given that sporting events have been targeted in the past.

Togo pulled out of the African Cup of Nations in January after its team bus was attacked by gunmen in Angola two days before the start of the tournament. A separatist group claimed responsibility for the attack that killed an assistant coach and a spokesman.

The next Gulf Cup in 2013 will be held in Basra, Iraq.