It was all aboard the Darwiche Express on Friday night as Balamand shunted Club Libanais into the sidings to open their campaign with an important victory. Diminutive hooker Darwich Darwiche proved a constant menace to Club Libanais, who had no answer to his attacking darts out of dummy half, while his cousin Omar Darwiche dictated the match from first receiver. Afforded all the time in the world by CL's lacklustre defence, to the extent where they were given virtual freedom of the park, between them Balamand's leaders accounted for five of their side's six tries and were the dominant forces in the match.

But leaders they needed to be as CL mounted a comeback that ephemerally threatened the Razorbacks' advantage. Two tries in four minutes closed the gap to 18-14 only for the visitors to surrender possession and territory – as they had all night – and allow Balamand's two stars to notch 74^th and 77^th minute tries that put a comfortable margin on the victory.

Club Libanais started brightly enough, opening the scoring in the 6th minute through their elite backline, which had benefited from the influx of players following NDU's suspension. In centres Ghassan Dandash and Rany Chahoud, halves Danny Chemaly and Roy Abla and fullback Pierre Nasr, CL boasted a wealth of current or former Liban Espoir caps, although it was through outstanding left wing Khalil Hijal that CL got off the mark. Chahoud took the ball from Abla and rifled a scoring pass out to Hijal who touched down in the corner for a well worked try. But as the game progressed Balamand's forwards took more and more control of their weaker counterparts – made weaker by a 5^th minute injury to lock Youssef El Helou - while a constant stream of penalties ensured CL remained on the defensive.

After Balamand's own boom lock, Wael Tawil, leveled matters in the 16^th minute, Darwiche Darwiche took advantage of a massive gap in the CL forward pack to cut through untouched for the softest of tries. Tawil's kick made it 10-4 at the break. Two more embarrassingly easy Darwiche tries following arcing runs from acting halfback stretched the lead to 18-4 with 18 minutes remaining, but rather than fold CL hit back. On 65 minutes Abla connected with Nasr on a second man play, with the former NDU custodian haring in under the posts. Abla's kick made it 18-10. Then, a rare CL penalty enabled Al-Galacticos to mount another attack, with Dandash, moved inside to the second row to add some much needed starch, running hard and offloading to El Helou who managed to ground under pressure. But with 11 minutes remaining the northerners' crafty cousins combined to bring Balamand home and dry.