Bahrain set up Serbia friendly

TDT | Manama  

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Bahrain’s senior men’s national football team have lined up an international friendly match against FIFA World Cup 2022 participants Serbia later this year. This was announced yesterday by the Bahrain Football Association.

The game is scheduled for November 18 and it will be played at the National Stadium in Riffa. It is scheduled for a 7pm kickoff. The match is the first confirmed for Bahrain since they successfully qualified for the AFC Asian Cup 2023 in June.

It will be part of their preparations for upcoming competitions. For the Serbians, the game will be leading up to their campaign in the FIFA World Cup 2022 in Qatar, where they have been drawn in Group G for the first round alongside Brazil, Switzerland and Cameroon.

The match is one of the most high-profile fixtures for Bahrain in recent years, as it pits them against a top-ranked national team from Europe. The Serbians are currently 25th in the FIFA World Ranking, including 14th amongst all teams in the Union of European Football Associations.

Bahrain are 85th, 12th amongst all squads in the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). According to the Football Federation of Serbia, their delegation will depart for the Kingdom on November 15. Following their match against the Bahrainis, they will travel to Doha on November 19.

Aside from their match with Bahrain, the Serbians are expected to play two more games in the League of Nations before the start of the FIFA World Cup. Serbia will host Sweden on September 24, before playing Norway in Oslo three days later.

The friendly with Serbia will be the second for Bahrain under head coach Helio Sousa against leading European opposition. The nationals also faced Ukraine in May of last year. Earlier this year, Bahrain were one of 11 nations to secure their AFC Asian Cup 2023 berths from the third and final round of qualifying.

From the six groups in that stage, all six winners and the five best runners-up made it through. The others to qualify were Jordan and Indonesia from Group A, Palestine from Group B, Uzbekistan and Thailand from Group C, India and Hong Kong from Group D, Malaysia behind Bahrain from Group E, and Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan from Group F.

They joined the 13 who had already claimed their places from the second round of qualification, namely Japan, Syria, Qatar, South Korea, Australia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, China, Iraq, Oman, Vietnam and Lebanon. All 24 teams will feature in next year’s AFC Asian Cup, which will be played at a yet to-be-determined venue after China withdrew as hosts.