UAE Pro League reveals 2025-26 season draw

ABU DHABI: The 2025-26 season fixtures for the ADNOC Pro League, ADIB Cup and eUAE Pro League Championship were announced at the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company’s headquarters on Sunday night.

The draw ceremony took place in the presence of club, sponsor and media representatives and was hosted by ADNOC, official sponsors of the UAE Pro League.

It was attended by Sultan Ahmed Al-Jaber, the UAE minister of industry and advanced technology and managing director and CEO of ADNOC and its group of companies. Also present were Abdullah Nasser Al-Jneibi, chairman of the UAE Pro League and first vice president of the UAE Football Association, Saif Al-Falahi, ADNOC’s group business support and special tasks director, ADNOC Distribution CEO Bader Saeed Al-Lamki, and Ahmed Al-Mubarak, ADIB’s head of commercial real estate and corporate finance.

The draw was presented by media personalities Yousef Saleh and Khaled Bayoumi and also featured the schedule for the sixth eUAE Pro League Championship, reflecting the growing importance of esports.

It was carried out using a smart electronic draw system first implemented in the 2021-22 season, highlighting the UAE government’s vision of the use of artificial intelligence technology via the OpenAI program, in line with the UAE Artificial Intelligence Strategy 2031.

This season, the UAE Pro League implemented a round-by-round draw system, in line with international best practices adopted by top leagues such as the English Premier League, Serie A and the Bundesliga.

The smart draw mechanism used a set of key criteria, including upholding sporting integrity, distributing matches based on 2024–25 season standings, balancing major and high-attendance fixtures, clubs’ external commitments,