Al Arabi

Sabah Al Salem Stadium holds 26,000, and Al-Arabi filled it once, in April 2015, for a Kuwait City derby against Kuwait SC that stands as the ground's attendance record. The club has played there through decades in which it collected more silverware than anyone else in the country — 17 league titles, 16 Emir Cups, a spread of domestic trophies that earned the side an unofficial name locals still use: the Trophy Castle.

The club traces back to 1953, formed as Al-Uruba. It became Al-Arabi on 20 October 1960, and after Kuwait's independence was re-registered on 11 November 1962. That early habit of winning set the pattern for the six decades that followed, with league championships arriving in clusters through the 1960s, 1980s and 1990s, and again as recently as 2020/21.

A nickname — Al-Za'eem, "the Boss" — that reflects the club's standing rather than any single triumph, and a rivalry with Al-Qadsia sharp enough to be called simply the Classico. Kuwaiti football's big three also includes Kuwait SC, but it is Al-Qadsia that Al-Arabi's supporters measure themselves against season to season.

Firas Al-Khatib is the name attached most firmly to the club's modern era, a forward whose spell there overlapped with some of Al-Arabi's later trophies. Taha Basri belongs to an earlier generation, remembered from the 1970s as a definitive Al-Arabi figure of that period. Croatian coach Ante Mišse took the club back to the league title in 2020/21, ending a wait that had stretched since 2002.