Qatar banks on Asian Cup heroes

QH TAKES A LOOK AT THE HOST NATION’S FIFA WORLD CUP DEBUT

Long-serving coach Felix Sanchez on November 11 announced a strong 26-man FIFA World Cup squad that mainly consists of players who featured prominently in their victorious Asian Cup title triumph in 2019.

Sanchez, who has been with the Qatar national squad for more than four years, included feared goalpoachers heroes who guided Qatar to their historic Asian Cup triumph in the UAE.

Ali, the Most Valuable Player from the to lead the team on their historic World Cup debut match on November 20 when the hosts take on Ecuador at the imposing Al Bayt Stadium. Hosts Qatar are in Group A alongside Ecuador, Senegal and The Netherlands.

Ali, who plays for Qatar Stars League (QSL) side Al Duhail, has scored a staggering 42 goals in just 85 matches for the Qatari national team. He was the highest scorer of the 2019 Asian Cup when he found the net an astonishing 9 times at an event where Qatar beat to play as a winger but the 2019 AFC Asian Player of the Year can also be part of the Qatar’s plans for every event they play, will need all possible help from experienced defender Abdelkarim Hassan, the 2018 Asian Player of the Year.

Also expected to lead the Qatari

THE SQUAD

GOALKEEPERS: Saad Alsheeb, Meshaal Barsham, Yousef Hassan

DEFENDERS: Pedro Miguel, Musaab Khidir, Tarek Salman, Bassam Al-Rawi, Boualem Khoukhi, Abdelkarim Hassan, Homam Ahmed, Jassem Gaber

MIDFIELDERS: Ali Asad, Assim Modibo, Mohammed Waad, Salem AlHajri, Moustafa Tarek, Karim Boudiaf, Abdelaziz Hatim, Ismail Mohamad

FORWARDS: Naif Alhadhrami, Ahmed Alaaeldin, Hassan Al-Haydos, Almoez Ali, Mohamed Muntari

COACH: Felix Sanchez

played more than 160 matches for the national side since making his teammates at Al Sadd also. Saad Al Sheeb will provide strength and experience when Qatar take on Ecuador (Nov 20), Senegal (Nov 25) and The Netherlands (Nov 29) in their Group A clashes.

In the last four years, Sanchez has kept his players extremely busy with the Qatar side featuring in Copa America and taking part in the

A series of friendlies in the last one year have kept the players in match practice ahead of what will be their debut at the game's showpiece event.

Qatar's young World Cup squad holds promise. Most of the current national team players have been under the mentorship of Sanchez – who guided Qatar to 2014 AFC Asian Cup U-20 glory in Myanmar where they has single handedly shaped the careers of star players of the AFC Asian Cup triumph in 2019.