Muscat, Dec 1
Oman national U-16 football team will travel to Bahrain on Sunday to begin the first overseas camp as part of the team’s preparation for the AFC U-16 Championship.
The scheduled external camp is the first for the team after restarting the sporting activities since August due to COVID-19 pandemic.
The team, coached by Hilal al Aufi, will have two preparatory matches in the camp against Bahrain U-16 football team.
The Sultanate team is currently undergoing their third domestic camp in Muscat and that will be followed by the abroad camp. The external camp in Manama city will shape more players technically and examine the current readiness status and support the coaching staff to have the initial kick off list.
The friendly matches with Bahrain team are crucial as they are the hosts of the Asian event and the team had commenced the restarting of training programme since more than four months.
Definitely, both matches will identify a lot for the coaching staff and allow the head coach to test many new faces and implement different tactical scenarios.
The technical director at the Oman Football Association (OFA) Slobodan Pavkovic, will join the team in the external camp in Bahrain. Presence of Serbian coach Pavkovic will definitely support the coaching staff and the team to implement the training sessions on better format and under high technical training standards.
The Asian event is the top assignment for the national junior team and the Sultanate team is under intensive programme to show the best during the championship.
The top Asian junior event is moved to 2021 and the exact dates of the championship will be announced later by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).
According to the AFC, the rules for the AFC U-16 Championship in Bahrain will allow players born on or after January 1, 2004 to play in the tournament.
Oman will play against Tajikistan, Yemen and the United Arab Emirates teams in Group B at the AFC U-16 Championship. The top two teams in the group will advance to the quarterfinal. The top four teams in the AFC U-16 finals will represent Asia at the Fifa U-17 World Cup in 2021 in Peru.
The existing list of the under way internal camp featured some new faces from Al Mudhaibi, Al Rustaq, Al Nasr and Ahli Sidab. The coaching staff of the national team believe in giving equal chances for all the players and the selection focuses on the top and potential members to represent the team at AFC U-16 Championship in Bahrain in 2021.
During the previous internal camps in the past few months, the head coach of national U-16 football team had understood on the physical and fitness situation of the players and noted down the strong and weak points on the technical status for each player. The U-16 team’s squad: Salim al Abdali, Jawad al Ezzi, Hamza al Eisari, Abdulrahman al Jabri, Murshid al Hamhami, Abdul Aziz al Ruzaiqi, Ammar al Saadi, Mishari al Hasani, Muhannad al Saadi (Suwaiq), Fahd al Mukhaini, Mamoun al Oraimi, (Al Oruba), Turki Abdullah, (Al Ettihad), AbdulMajid al Balushi, Ali al Balushi, Al Mundher al Hasani (Oman), Ayham al Raqqadi, Abdulaleem al Rawahi (Fanja), Mansoor al Amri (Al Salam), Mohammed al Muqbali (Sohar), Al Motasim al Sameen (Dhofar) and Khalid al Hashemi (Al Nahda), Ibrahim al Habsi (Al Mudhaibi), Mohammed Sameer al Balushi (Ahli Sidab), Mohammed Abdulhakeem (Al Nasr) and Ahmed al Hilali (Al Rustaq).
Adil Al Balushi
Oman Observer is now on the WhatsApp channel. Click here
