Behind The Opponents’ Lines: United Arab Emirates

The anticipation is palpable, the nerves are shaking and excitement is building. In three days, the Harimau Malaya will play competitively after a nearly two-year gap without any proper action in the World Cup/Asia Cup qualifying.

However, preparations have been rocky so to say. Along with questions about who Tan Cheng Hoe (TCH) called up, how the warm-up friendlies went has been less than ideal when we lost 4-1 to Kuwait and then 2-0 to Bahrain five days later. You can read what went down in the Bahrain match here.

It also doesn’t help that with North Korea’s withdrawal, determining the best runners-up will not count results against last-placed teams. This means we are bottom among the second-placed teams with only three points, so we can’t afford to drop precious points, especially being in a promising position in our group.

While we covered our situation briefly heading into a tough run-in, we wonder how has our opponents been getting ready compared to us. Have their own preparations gone smoothly or has it been a rocky road? That’s why we asked an expert on each of our upcoming opponents about how they have been getting ready for this crucial restart where there is no room for error.

In the first of this three-part mini-series, we will preview the United Arab Emirates (UAE). To get to know more about the team, we asked Wael Jabir, the founder & CEO of Ahdaaf and also a freelance football writer. He has written for numerous media sites such as The Asian Game and Arab News and an expert on the Middle East football scene.

The Preparations

The United Arab Emirates underwent many head coach changes perhaps for anyone’s liking in the last two years since their last qualifying match before settling to reappoint Dutch head coach Bert Van Marwijk. Despite that headache-inducing rotation of personnel changes, Jabir noted that bringing Van Marwijk back is a welcoming decision.

“It was more a case of the players and the (UAE) FA realising what they had with Van Marwijk were a good relationship and a project. So acknowledging that mistake and bringing him back was welcomed by all,” said Wael. Wael also stated that it “remains to be seen what happens depending on the results of the rest of the qualifiers” whether if Van Marwijk’s second stint will be much longer than his first.

The UAE team gathered on 15th May for centralized save for seven players who play for Shabab Ah-Ahli and Al-Nasr, who joined their teammates on the 19th due to the teams playing the final of the President’s Cup, UAE’s domestic cup, on the 16th. UAE played one friendly match heading into qualifying as they won it excellently with a 5-1 drubbing of Jordan where Ali Mabkhout scored a hat-trick along with Khalil Ibrahim and Caio Canedo. Their last match before that was another drubbing, thrashing India 6-0 in late March where Mabkhout also scored a hat-trick.

The Players

So you can see why Jabir has picked the hotshot striker as the player to watch. With his 71 goals in 88 international appearances, Mabkhout is currently the national team’s all-time top scorer as well as the UAE Pro League’s (UAE’s top division) all-time top scorer. Mabkhout made himself known to us when he had a confrontation with Brendan Gan early in the match when the teams met in October 2019. That set the tone of the atmosphere where every time he gets the ball, he would be booed by the fans. Unfortunately for us, he silenced Bukit Jalil by scoring a brace that led to UAE’s victory over us 2-1 despite Harimau Malaya’s valiant effort. Other than Mabkhout, Wael also told us of three other players to keep an eye on.

“Elsewhere, creativity will come from the three left-footed players in midfield; Fabio Lima on the right-wing, Khalfan Mubarak at number 10 and Abdullah Ramadan from central midfield,” noted Wael. While Mabkhout needs to be given extra attention by defenders, cutting out the service given to him is just as crucial to stopping the UAE.

UAE though does have a few notable players missing from the squad. Namely, Ahmed Khalil and Omar Abdulrahman, who were crowned the 2015 & 2016 Asian Player Of The Year respectively, as Wael explains the reason why they are missing out.

“Both of them have been struggling with long term injuries and have not played since the start of the year. More recently, winger Ali Saleh was withdrawn from the squad with an injury,” stated Wael. Ali Saleh, the 21-year old winger who has won 11 caps for the UAE, will also sadly miss the chance to shine. Despite missing some noteworthy players, it seems it isn’t too concerning for the Al Abyad.

“While Abdulrahman and Khalil are high profile players, Bert van Marwijk has already built the team around other players, so they will not really impact his plans,” stated Wael.

Challenges & Expectations

Therefore, it seems it’s a rather smooth sailing for UAE’s preparations. When asked if there is any weakness about the team, Wael stated there is “Nothing in particular in terms of players”. However, he did mention there is one concern.

“I think the biggest challenge for Van Marwijk is to create the chemistry between the players because this is not a group that is used to playing together all the time, so might need time to gel,” said Wael.

Considering all of this, there doesn’t seem to be a major problem within the UAE camp. Along with trouble-free planning, keep in mind the UAE also has home advantage by hosting the group. Therefore, expectations are high for Al Abyad.

“Playing at home, the expectations will be to make up for the poor results of the first part of the qualifiers, including the defeats to Vietnam and Thailand. Nothing less than winning all remaining games will be acceptable for UAE fans,” stated Wael.

Conclusion

It may have been cruel for Malaysia to not get anything from the UAE the last time these two met given how it went. But it’s going to be much, much tougher for the Harimau Malaya to get something from it compared to their previous encounter. Somehow in some way, the team has to believe if they want to get a result from these heavy hitters.

As for the UAE, they will buoyant on their chances, especially with Mabkhout having the time of his life as well as a reliable support cast and a credible head coach in Van Marwijk leading the charge once again. Expectations may be low from Malaysia’s perspective given the gap between these two sides, but we’ll be proud as long as the Harimau Malaya puts up a hell of a fight for all of the 90 minutes.

We would like to thank Mr Wael Jabir for taking the time to answer all our questions about the UAE national football team and their preparations for the World Cup/Asia Cup qualifying. If you want to know more about the UAE team or Middle East football, you can follow Wael on Twitter at @waeljabir.

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