GS Petroliers
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Wikipedia - MC Alger (basketball)
Mouloudia Club d'Alger (Arabic: نادي مولودية الجزائر), referred to as MC Alger or MCA for short, is an Algerian basketball team that was founded on 7 August 1921, as a division of MC Alger. They play their home games in the Hacène Harcha Arena, which has a capacity of 8,000 people. The team has won a record twenty-one Algerian national championships, as well as twenty Algerian Cups.
History
The team was originally part of the Mouloudia Club d'Alger (MC Alger) club, but became a part of Groupement Sportif des Pétroliers (Arabic: المجمع الرياضي البترولي; English: Sports Group of Oil Fields) on 2 June 2008. Starting from the 1999–2000 season, the team has won numerous titles in Algeria.
By the start of the 2023–24, the defending champions CSM Constantine had lost most of its star players and GS Pétroliers returned to win the title for six consecutive seasons, in addition to nine consecutive cup wins. Due to its winning streak and sponsorship from Sonatrach, GS Pétroliers was the only club not to struggle with financial issues in the early 2010s. The 2019–20 and 2020–21 season were then cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
On 30 November 2019, GS Pétroliers qualified for the 2020 season of the Basketball Africa League (BAL), by winning the West Division of the qualifying tournaments. The season was later rescheduled to 2021 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the group stage, GSP lost its three game and could not qualify for the playoffs.
From 2008 to 2020, the team was known as GS Pétroliers as it was part of the multi-sports club with that name.
The team's name changed back to MC Alger in 2020.
Il club gioca le partite casalinghe all'Arena di Kouba, che ha una capacità di 5.000 spettatori. La squadra è allenata da Messaoud Bessaih, ex cestista che ha giocato con la nazionale algerina. I giocatori più importanti del GS Pétroliers sono il centro Abdelhalim Kaouane, la guardia tiratrice Amine Noua e l'ala piccola Toufik Ayoub.
Il GS Pétroliers è una squadra molto popolare in Algeria e rappresenta uno dei simboli dello sport nazionale. La squadra è sostenuta da un folto gruppo di tifosi che la seguono sia in casa che in trasferta.