--- title: "Árabe Unido Powers to Best Start in Seven Years With 18 Points" date: 2026-09-19 author: "Panama Daily News" url: https://panamadaily.news/2026/09/19/arabe-unido-powers-to-best-start-in-seven-years-with-18-points/ categories: - "Sports" --- # Árabe Unido Powers to Best Start in Seven Years With 18 Points Deportivo Árabe Unido is flying high in Panama’s Liga Panameña de Fútbol. A 2-1 comeback victory over San Francisco on Friday night at the Rommel Fernández Stadium lifted the Colón-based club provisionally to the top of the Eastern Conference with 18 points after nine rounds — its best start to a campaign since the Clausura 2019. ## What Happened San Francisco struck first, continuing a season-long trend of scoring before halftime. Ronaldo Dinolis converted a penalty in the 38th minute, extending the team’s streak of first-half goals to nine consecutive matches under coach Jorge Dely Valdés. But Árabe Unido answered before the break. Veteran midfielder Armando Cooper equalized in the fourth minute of first-half stoppage time, his third goal of the tournament. Dionisio Bernal then scored the winner in the 65th minute, becoming the ninth different player to find the net for the club this Apertura. San Francisco’s hopes of a comeback faded when Valentín Pimentel received a second yellow card seven minutes from the end, leaving the Monjes with ten men. The result marked Árabe Unido’s third consecutive victory over San Francisco and extended the club’s own winning streak to three matches, following wins against Veraguas United and Unión Coclé. The fixture carried a sense of history: the two sides met at the same stadium in the final of the 2010 Clausura, and sixteen years later the Expreso Azul once again came out on top in Juan Díaz. ## Background Under coach Juan Sergio Guzmán, Árabe Unido has compiled five wins, three draws and just one defeat, scoring 13 goals and conceding six. The team’s path to the summit has been steady rather than explosive. The Apertura began with a 2-2 draw against Plaza Amador, followed by the lone loss, 0-1 against Alianza, and a goalless draw with Umecit. Since then, the team has taken four wins and a draw from its last five matches, averaging three goals per game during the current three-game winning streak. Since the LPF adopted the conference system, Árabe Unido has topped the Eastern Conference only once in eleven tournaments — the Clausura 2022, when it finished with 25 points after 16 rounds. At its current pace, the club is on track for 32 points by the end of the regular phase, which would surpass that mark. The squad blends experience with youth. Gustavo Chará and Chamir Chupuy, both 30, anchor the central defense, while 38-year-old Cooper remains a driving force in midfield and leads the team in scoring. Around them, a young core — Octavio Reefer and Jaime Harrison (22), Rubén Collymore (19), Jonathan Filos (20), Omar Llerena (23), Fernando Mclean (22) and Mario Breary (22) — rank among the ten field players with the most minutes in the championship. After the match, Cooper emphasized the collective effort: “It’s a team where everyone has to run, and it doesn’t matter who it is. I’m committed to that too.” He also credited the fitness levels to consistent weekly work and praised the supporters who have backed the team since day one, both at the Armando Dely Valdés stadium and on the road. Guzmán described his team’s identity as “a model of possession, high pressing and suffocating the opponent,” adding that the players are executing it “very, very well” against a San Francisco side that arrived as one of the most solid teams in the championship. ## What This Means for Panama Árabe Unido’s resurgence is significant for a club that is one of the traditional powers of Panamanian football but has rarely dominated the conference era. Sitting provisionally above Plaza Amador, the Colón side has positioned itself as a genuine title contender in the Apertura 2026. The broad distribution of goalscorers — nine different players have scored — and the mix of veterans mentoring young talent suggest the strong form is built on squad depth rather than reliance on a single striker. With high pressing and possession as the tactical foundation, the question now is whether the Expreso Azul can sustain this pace through the remaining rounds of the regular season and convert its best start in seven years into a deep playoff run. This story was originally reported by [La Prensa](https://www.prensa.com/deportes/arabe-unido-acelera-18-puntos-y-su-mejor-arranque-en-siete-anos/).