FOOTBALL – BAHRAIN’S senior men’s football national team lock horns with their counterparts from Qatar tonight in an international friendly match in Doha.
The contest is scheduled for a 6.15pm kick-off, Bahrain time, and it will be held at Al Thumama Stadium in the Qatari capital.
The game will be the first of two official tune-ups for the Bahrainis in the coming week. They are also set to face off with the UAE’s senior men’s squad on Monday in Dubai.
The nationals will be playing their friendlies as part of Fifa’s international break. They are gearing up for their upcoming competitions, headlined by the Fifa Arab Cup 2025 this December, also to be held in Doha.
Bahrain head coach Dragan Talajic supervised the team’s training session last night ahead of today’s exhibition. The Croatian tactician has called up 31 players for this period. They include Mohammed Jassim Marhoon, Mohammed Al Rumaihi, Amine Benaddi, Waleed Al Hayyam, Abdulla Al Khalasi, Ahmed Bughammar, Hamad Shamsan, Sayed Mahdi Baqer, Sayed Dhiya Saeed, Hussain Al Eker, Vincent Emmanuel, Hazza Ali, Hussain Jameel, Mahdi Humaidan, Ali Madan, Ahmed Al Sherooqi, Omar Saber, Jassim Al Shaikh, Komail Al Aswad, Hussain Abdulkarim, Mahdi Abduljabbar, Ebrahim Al Khattal, Abdulla Al Subaie, Sayed Mahmoud Al Mosawi, Ahmed Dhiya, Hussain Zuhair, and Sayed Mahdi Sharaf, along with goalkeepers Ebrahim Luthfallah, Mohammed Al Gharably, Abdulkarim Al Fardan, and Yousef Habib.
Meanwhile, Qatar’s Spanish coach Julen Lopetegui has named 26 players to his team for the friendly.
The list includes Ahmed Al Janahi, Ahmed Al Rawi, Ahmed Suhail, Ahmed Fathi, Akram Afif, Ahmed Alaa, Ismaeel Mohammed, Edmilson Junior, Bassam Al Rawi, Almahdi Ali, Boualem Khoukhi, Pedro Miguel, Jassim Jaber, Sultan Al Braik, Tarek Salman, Assim Madibo, Abdulaziz Hatem, Guilherme Torres, Karim Boudiaf, Mohammed Khaled, Mohammed Muntari, Mohammed Munaee, and Homam El Amin, along with goalkeepers Meshaal Barsham, Salah Zakaria, and Mahmud Abunada.
Following tonight’s match, the Bahrainis will be travelling to Dubai tomorrow ahead of their UAE clash, which will take place at Dubai’s Zabeel Stadium, scheduled for a 7.15pm kick-off, Bahrain time.
The two friendlies will be Bahrain’s first official games since their disappointing exit from the third round of Asian qualifiers for the Fifa World Cup 2026 last June. They had played a number of exhibition matches against European clubs during their overseas training camp in Maribor, Slovenia, in July.
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