Emirati and Iraqi race to forefront the first group

Khalifa International Stadium will host at 5:30 p.m. tomorrow a promising confrontation to precede the first group of the Gulf Championship 24 between UAE and Iraq.

The two teams scored the three points on the first day of the tournament and are in a better position to continue their career.

Iraq, which made a remarkable performance in the first round against the home side and the public, came out to be praised, is armed this time with the readiness of 23 players, unlike the confrontation with Qatar, where coach Katanic sat on the bench eight players from the police.

Katanic confirmed before the match that he was realistic in dealing with every 90 minutes saying: “Football is like this. Qatar was better, but they did not score goals and we scored. I am realistic and realize that tomorrow’s game is very difficult, and the players have to show all their potential to win, and I hope the Qatar scenario will be repeated again.”

The young Mohammed Qassim, who stole the limelight in the first round, will be in sight alongside with Muhannad Ali, defense chiefs Maytham Jabbar, Ahmed Ibrahim and Amjad Kalaf. While on the other side, the UAE team left no doubt on the opening day, where they ended the Yeman’s mission through a hat-trick by their historical scorer in all Gulf tournaments, Khaleej Ali Mabkhout, where his coach expects the team to move upward in the tournament.

Marwijk confirmed before the encounter the big readiness of his players as he said: “Everyone knows that we started months ago and we have young players, and we want to win every game. We need time to develop and upgrade our players.”

Regarding his plan against Iraq: “We train daily in a special way. I like to play offensive but sometimes we have to change, and we will start to face Iraq in a way that leads us to win.”

Tomorrow’s showdown is the eleventh in the history of the two teams in the Gulf tournaments, where the two teams are equal in winnings, with two wins and the draws on six occasions. Iraq scored 13 goals against 7 by the UAE.