Bahrain set for West Asian football
TDT | Manama
The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com
A 23-player roster has been finalised for Bahrain’s under-23 Olympic football team to compete in the third West Asian Football Federation (WAFF) U-23 Championship.
The tournament is to be held in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, kicking off on Thursday and continuing until 15 November.
Olympic team head coach Dario Basic from Croatia has made his selections for the competition, in which Bahrain have been drawn in Group B along with hosts Saudi and Syria for the opening stage.
Bahrain’s players include Mustafa Al Salem, Ahmed Rabia, Hassan Taha, Hussain Abdulkarim, Sayed Jawad Haider, Salem Hussain, Ali Mohammed Redha, Ammar Mirza, Adel Al Rumaihi, Saleh Al Zubaidi, Ali Kamel, Ahmed Kamel, Bashir Fouad, Mohammed Abdulqayoom, Ali Al Dosari, Ahmed Abdulhamid, Abdulla Al Khalasi, Omar Saber, Vincent Emmanuel, Hassan Abdulnabi, Hussain Al Ekri, Abdulrahman Al Kooheji and Abdulla Freah.
The team has already left for Jeddah ahead of the start of play.
Prior to their departure, Bahrain Football Association vice-president His Highness Shaikh Khalifa bin Ali Al Khalifa visited the squad during their training session at Hamad Town Stadium.
He met with the players and staff and encouraged them for the WAFF tournament.
HH Shaikh Khalifa said that it is an important event to help them prepare for their upcoming participation in the qualifiers of the AFC U23 Asian Cup 2024, which will be held next year.
In the tournament’s first phase, Group A features Oman, Qatar and Lebanon.
Iraq, Kuwait and Yemen were also supposed to compete, but had withdrawn. Bahrain open their campaign on match day one on Thursday against Syria at 9pm, Bahrain time.
The nationals then have a rest on match day two, before taking on the host Saudis on match day three on 9 November.
According to the tournament system, following a single round-robin within their pools, the top two teams qualify for the semi-finals.
There will then be gold and bronze medal games.
In the last edition of the WAFF U-23 Championship, Jordan were the champions while Saudi finished as runners-up.
The nationals were ousted from the group stage without any wins in two matches.
The AFC U23 Asian Cup is the premier continental event for Olympic teams.
Bahrain have taken part in the tournament just once in the past in 2020, when they did not make it past the group stage.
The 2024 tournament will mark the sixth edition.
The last event was played in June of this year in Uzbekistan, and Saudi Arabia were crowned champions among the 16 participating nations.
Bahrain did not qualify.
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