TDT | Manama
Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com
Bahrain coach Juan Antonio Pizzi has named a full senior men’s national football team of 26 players for this month’s two matches in the 2026 FIFA World Cup continental qualifiers.
Bahrain will face Yemen on November 16th at the Prince Sultan bin Abdulaziz Sports City in Abha, Saudi Arabia, and will face the UAE at the National Stadium in Riffa on November 21st.
Pizzi fielded some of Bahrain’s biggest names in qualifying.
Among them are Ali Madan of UAE’s Ajman Club, Mohamed Marhoun of Kuwait’s Kuwait SC, Abdullah Yusuf of Czech Republic’s FK Mlada Boleslav, and Moses of Malaysia’s Kedah Darul Aman FC.・Includes four professionals from the kingdom’s overseas bases called Atede. .
Meanwhile, his local selections are from defending Nasser Bin Hamad Bahrain Premier League champions Al Khaldiya, Rifa, Muharraq, Manama, Al Ahly and Al Najma.
Mahdi Humaidan, Ahmed Bouganmal, Mohamed Adel, and Mohamed Al Hadan were selected from Khaldiya.
From Rifa are Abdulkarim Al Fardan, Ali Hassan, Saeed Mahdi Baqer, Hussein Al Akel, Komail Al Aswad, Jassim Al Shaikh, Mohamed Abdul Qayyum, and Hazza Ali.
Those from Muharraq are Saeed Mohamed Ja’afar, Amin Hassan, Waleed al-Khayyam, Abdullah al-Harashi, and Mubarak Mohamed. Meanwhile, from Al Ahli are Ebrahim Rusfallah and Abdullah Al Hasash.
Ebrahim al-Khattar was selected from Manama, and Mohamed Abdulwahab and Ebrahim al-Wali from Najma were named as members. Kickoff His national team is scheduled to begin its training program on Sunday.
Apart from qualifying for the FIFA World Cup, Bahrain is also preparing for the next AFC Asian Cup to be held in Doha next January.
These will be the national team’s first official matches under coach Pizzi.
The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) FIFA World Cup qualifying format has five rounds, with eight teams booking tickets to the Global Showcase, with the possibility of one more round after the inter-confederation play-offs.
Bahrain have advanced directly to the second qualifying round in Group H along with the UAE, Yemen and Nepal.
After the next two matches, qualifying will resume next year.
They will play Nepal on March 21 and again on March 26.
They will then play against Yemen on June 6th and conclude this stage with a match against UAE on June 11th.
A total of 36 countries are participating in this phase, divided into nine groups of four.
Each team will play against each other in a home and away format.
The nine group winners and group runners-up will advance to the third round.
In addition to this, they will also automatically qualify for the 2027 AFC Asian Cup.
Bahrain’s Abdullah Yusuf played against the Philippines in an international friendly match last month.