Bassam Al-Rawi


Bassam Hisham Ali al-Rawi is an Iraqi-born naturalised Qatari footballer who plays as a defender for Al-Duhail and the Qatar national team.

International career

2019 AFC Asian Cup

Al-Rawi was included in Qatar's squad for the 2019 AFC Asian Cup in the United Arab Emirates. Al-Rawi made his first international goal on 9 January 2019 in the 2019 AFC Asian Cup against Lebanon. In the same tournament on 22 January 2019, he scored his second international and the winning goal for Qatar against his country of origin, Iraq, which helped his team reach the quarter-finals of the competition. His team would eventually conquer the Asian title for the first time.

Eligibility dispute

On 30 January 2019, soon after the Asian Cup 2019 semi-final tie between the UAE and Qatar, which Qatar won with a 4–0 victory, the UAE FA lodged a formal appeal to the on the fact that Bassam Al Rawi, a 21-year-old defender born in Baghdad, did not qualify to play for Qatar on residency grounds of the Article 7 of the FIFA statutes, which states a player's eligibility to play for a representative team if he has "lived continuously for at least five years after reaching the age of 18 on the territory of the relevant association". It was claimed that Bassam had not lived continuously in Qatar for at least five years over the age of 18. On 1 February 2019 the AFC Disciplinary and Ethics Committee dismissed the protest lodged by the United Arab Emirates Football Association.

Career statistics

International

International goals

No.DateVenueOpponentScoreResultCompetition
1.9 January 2019Hazza bin Zayed Stadium, Al Ain, United Arab Emirates1–02–02019 AFC Asian Cup
2.22 January 2019Al Nahyan Stadium, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates1–01–02019 AFC Asian Cup

Honours

Club

;Al-Duhail
;Qatar
Al-Rawi is the son of former Iraqi international footballer Hisham Ali Al-Rawi, who was active on the international scene in the 1990s.