18 Aug 2015
Linz, 18 August 2015. When Qatar’s men national team played a 2-2 draw against Austrian second division side LASK Linz on Monday, both sides featured graduates of Aspire Academy.
Since Aspire Academy has started cooperating with the Austrian club, student-athletes as well as graduates have used the chance to gain international experience in Linz with a club that has teams in the country’s second and third division.
In the friendly game against Qatar’s national team, three of these players – Assim Madibo, Abdulla Almoez - who were both recently featured in a second division league game for the first time - and Jassim Al-Jalabi had the chance to play against the team of coach Jose Carreno, that included Aspire Academy graduates such as the young KAS Eupen-players Akram Afif, who played 78 minutes, and Ahmad Moein, who was on the bench.
The Qatari National Team used the training camp in Austria and Switzerland as part of their preparations for the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifying games against Bhutan and Hong Kong in September. Before the game against LASK Linz, they played a 1-1 draw against the Greek league champion Olympiacos FC.
Qatar will take on Bhutan in the next 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifying game on September 3 at Jassim Bin Hamad Stadium. Soon after playing this game at Qatar, they will fly out to Hong Kong for their third qualifying game at Mongkok Stadium on September 8.
Find out more on: http://www.qfa.com.qa/.