Oman national U-16 football team will take on Qatar team on Sunday in the second preparatory match as both teams gear up for AFC Asian Championship which will be held in Bahrain during September 13 to October 3.
The first friendly match ended for the guests 2-0 on Friday at Al Rustaq Sports Complex. Qatar’s goals scored by Abdulfattah Siraj and Abdulrahman Khalid.
The warm up matches against Qatar came as part of the domestic camp for the team under watchful eyes of the experienced coach in junior teams Hilal al Oufi and his technical assistant staff.
The head coach was very keen to organise the camps in this period as most of the players in a winter break prior starting of the second educational semester.
This internal camp is followed after an abroad camp in UAE where the Sultanate junior team played two preparatory matches against UAE team. The first match ended in a 2-2 draw while Oman team suffered to a 4-2 loss in the second match.
The national coach Hilal al Oufi aimed from this international friendlies to raise the players’ international exposure and gained the experience to develop and form a good competitive team for the finals. Besides that, the technical staff focused on the new faces and joined them to the international match level to gain the required exposure and more experience.
All the 16 teams are awaiting the draw of the AFC Asian Cup Championship which is scheduled to take place in Manama city in middle of April.
The winners of all the eleven groups were: Tajikistan (A), India (B), Islamic Republic of Iran (C), Saudi Arabia (D), Qatar (E), United Arab Emirates (F), China PR (G), Australia (H), DPR Korea (I), Japan (J) and Korea Republic (K). The best four runners-up from all the groups were Yemen (E), Indonesia (G), Uzbekistan (B) and Oman (D).
Oman national U-16 football team had booked their slot at the AFC Asian Cup Championship in September. Oman’s junior team qualified to the finals as runner-up in Group D which clubbed hosts Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Syria teams after earning seven points. Oman was one of the four best second-placed teams alongside Yemen, Indonesia and Uzbekistan from the eleven qualification groups.
Oman team had began their campaign at the AFC Asian qualification with a 2-0 victory against Pakistan. Mashari al Hasani and Mamoun al Oraimi netted the goals for the Sultanate. Then, the national team beat Syria 1-0 as Abdullah al Jabri scored the all-the important goal in the dying minutes. Oman and Saudi Arabia the hosts played out a goalless draw in the last group match. Saudi Arabia topped the group by seven points with superior goal difference than Sultanate team which have same number of points. Pakistan and Syria teams were positioned in third and fourth places respectively as both teams had one point each.
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