As noted a day ago, this is a country in which the citizens are a small minority of the population. Expats often are encouraged to get to know an Emirati, but it’s not as easy as thinking, “OK, I’ll do that!” Not when most of the Emiratis you see are inside their SUVs, driving down the street.

That’s why the President’s Cup final tonight really got my attention. Beyond the game, that is.

It may be the most thoroughly Emirati experience an outsider can be part of, and here’s why:

Attendance at Zayed Sports City Stadium: 37,408.

And the overwhelming majority of them, if we judge by traditional Emirati dress (white robes, head scarves, sandals) … were Emiratis.

That’s a huge number in the context of …

–In the whole country not even 950,000 people are citizens.

–Let’s assume half of that number is female. That leaves 475,000 male Emiratis.

–The crowd was overwhelming male.

–Thus, if at least 30,000 of the spectators were Emiratis males (and that almost certainly is a low number), we had inside Zayed Stadium about about 6 percent of all Emirati males in the country.

The event had a thoroughly Emirati flavor. The programs were in Arabic only. The start lists for the game were in Arabic only — until the three English-speaking reporters asked for (and got) translations from the Football Association media people.

Before the game, the army marching band came on the field, led by 15 bagpipes, which seems to be a Middle East invention even though it often is associated with Scotland.

The singing was in Arabic. The chants and call-and-response cheers … Arabic. Nearly everyone was in what we at The National call “traditional” dress. (Which is illegal for expatriates to wear, by the way.)

I have never seen that many kandouras in one place. And may never again.

The Fifa Club World Cup, at the same venue in December, had a bigger crowd for the title match. But far more than half of that crowd were Westerners.

The President’s Cup is by and for Emiratis. And they took this one particularly seriously because the two leading clubs in the emirate of Abu Dhabi, home to 42 percent of the country’s citizens, were playing — Al Jazira and Al Wahda.

The crowning moment of the Emirati experience came after the match, when the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed, received players from both sides, and the Emirati players all looked very excited, even the guys on the losing team. Like Brits going to see the queen. (This has been a big deal forever; while he was alive, Sheikh Zayed, Mohammed’s father, and widely considered the George Washington of the UAE, gave out the trophy every year.)

The players embraced the crown prince and kissed the golden stripe on the right side of his robe. Several asked him to put his signature directly onto their jerseys.

I wasn’t part of this, of course. As a journalist, we are always a bit detached, and we watched the meet-with-the-prince part on TV, because it happened just below us, at the stadium, and we had no line of sight.

But I was there to write a column out of the match, and I saw the huge turnout, and I heard the sounds and felt the stadium shake, and I watched the Emiratis do obeisance with royalty.

It was not like a night at a club in Dubai. It was not like a day at the paper, in a room full of expats. It was a big event for the people who live in this country and won’t be leaving.

I was glad, and fascinated, to be able to watch it with my own eyes.

Oh, and final score: Al Jazira 4, Al Wahda 0. My colleague Amith Passela did the game story. 

And first President’s Cup triumph for Jazira. A big deal.