This season started a little earlier, way back on the 13th of August with the Sheikh Jassim Cup and saw a dramatic finish to the game as new Al Sadd signing Muriqui bagged a late winner in the 86th minute to beat Lekhwiya 3-2.
Unlike past seasons the tournament format changed from a group stage pre-season contest featuring all Qatar Stars League sides, to a one-off match between the previous season’s Qatar Stars League winners (Lekhwiya) and the previous winner of the Emir Cup (Al Sadd).
The Qatar Stars League itself saw many new players and coaches arrive such as striker Hamdi Harboui, defender Chico Flores, Al Sadd forward Muriqui and playmaker Romarinho. However fan favourites such as Tabata, Khalfan Ibrahim, Magid Mohammed, Hassan Haydous, Meshal Abdulla and Ismael Mohammed also had good seasons, scoring vitals goals in big matches.
The biggest coach to arrive to Qatari shores was ex-Swansea City managers Michael Laudrup, the Dane joined up with Champions Lekhwiya and managed to win the league in his first season.
This season the league had in total 23 coaches arrive at various clubs throughout the season, only Lekhwiya, Al Sadd, Umm Salal, Al Sailiya, Al Khor managed to see out the season with the same coaches who began the 2014/15 campaign.
In the first half of the season Sadd had the best from in the league, having not lost a single game; however they got a number of injuries in the second half of the season which saw them fall away come the business end of the season. They lost a total of three matches in the second half of the season.
The surprise package of the season was Qatar Sports Club, who started the two first rounds terribly but with a change of head coach (Radhi Shenaishil took over form Ivan Hašek); the club went from strength to strength and finished in 4th position in the Qatar Stars League.
There were 613 goals in total from 182 matches, which is up on last year’s goals tally of 542 goals. The average goals per game went up from 2.98 to 3.37. The total number of assist went up too (522). 70 penalties were awarded, that’s down 6 from last season. Clean sheets went down slightly this season with 73, whilst the season before saw 88.
The top scorers this season were:
| 1 | Alain Dioko – Al Ahli SC | 25 |
| 2 | Hamdi Harboui – Qatar SC | 21 |
| 3 | Hasan Abd Al Fatah – Al Kharaitiyat | 16 |
| 4 | Romarinho – El Jaish | 16 |
| 5 | Julio Cesar – Al Khor | 16 |
The top assisters this season were:
| 1 | Nam Tae-Hee – Lekhwiya | 13 |
| 2 | Magid Mohammed – El Jaish | 13 |
| 3 | Shaheen Ali Mahmoud – Qatar SC | 10 |
| 4 | Mohassine Moutaouli – Al Wakrah | 10 |
| 5 | Mojtaba Jabari – Al Ahli | 8 |
The league saw two new teams join the competition, Al Shamal who hadn’t been back in the top flight since 2009 and Al Shahania who had their debut and actually performed better out of the two. The Oryxes won 5 matches whilst Al Shamal struggled and only got the one win against Al Khor in round 22 (1-0) .
Lekhwiya won the league with a round to spare with 62 points; they lost just twice and drew 5 times. They won 19 games and scored the second most number of goals in the league after Al Sadd. More crucially the only conceded 25 goals which proved how important the defensive aspect to their game was.
Lekhwiya didn’t stop there; domestically they also won the second edition of the Qatar Cup, beating El Jaish by a single goal. The game itself was very evenly balanced and the breakthrough came in the final minute of normal time as Weiss won a penalty and converted to get himself and his club their first ever Qatar Cup trophy.
The Emir Cup saw Al Sadd restore some pride for their fans as they beat team after team in the qualifying rounds before dispatching El Jaish 2-1. Brazilian striker Muriqui, again coming up with the goods in the cup competitions as he scored the winner in the 66th minute.
International successes
The season also saw some triumphs on the national level with Qatar winning the 22nd edition of the Gulf Cup in Saudi Arabi, beating the hosts in the final 2-1. It was their third ever Gulf Cup finals win.
The under 19 Qatar national team also had their day in the sun as they won the 2014 AFC U-19 Championships in Myanmar.
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