As the war in Iran began in early March and airspace across the Persian Gulf was closed, the grand ambitions of the Iraqi national football team drifted far into the distance. For months they prepared for March 31, the day of the decisive playoff match for one of the last qualifying spots for the 2026 World Cup. On that day Iraq could qualify for the world’s most important football tournament for the first time in forty years. But the playoff venue, Monterrey in Mexico, now seemed almost unreachable as many airports in the region were closed.
The Iraqi Football Association had to improvise and scrapped a training camp in Houston, USA. There they had planned to acclimate to the climate in mid-March and then fly on to Mexico. But now, during the war in neighboring Iran, the players traveled from their Iraqi residences by land to Arar, a border town in northern Saudi Arabia.
From there they flew to Mexico on a private plane. “A major practical problem for the team was obtaining visas in time,” says Robert Chatterjee, deputy editor of the Middle East magazine Zenith. “But the Mexican authorities apparently showed a great deal of accommodation. And thus the team entered promptly.” The playoff opponent on this Tuesday is Bolivia.
Iraq, a country with nearly 50 million inhabitants, was shaped for decades by war, terror, and economic crises. But in recent years the state regained relative political stability. Companies were founded, foreign investors settled. In football, the government and the federation built new pitches and improved talent development.
Brutal Football History
The national team, which had played its home games abroad for security reasons for almost 30 years, was allowed by FIFA to host competitive matches in front of a home crowd again. Not in the capital Baghdad, but in Basra and Erbil. “Football stood symbolically for a sense of renewal,” says Chatterjee. “In Iraq, inner cities were refurbished, tourism was growing again. But all of that is now at risk because of the Iran war.”
Iraq is an ethnically and religiously diverse country. In the 1980s and 1990s it was dictator Saddam Hussein who used violence to curb tensions, between Sunnis and Shiites, between Kurds and Islamists. The football clubs were tightly linked to the army, ministries, and police. And in the Iraqi Football Association Udai Hussein had the say, the eldest son of the head of state.
“If the team won, Udai Hussein rewarded the players with houses,” says Iraqi television journalist Rafeq Alokaby. “But if they lost, he put them in prison and shaved their heads. There was also no freedom in football.”
After the surprising victory at the 2007 Asian Championship, euphoria knew no bounds
After the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003, Iraq sank into chaos—terror attacks, kidnappings, injuries from landmines. The football association housed offices in Jordan. Players who did not want to leave their homeland wore weapons and bulletproof vests. Time and again, the so-called Islamic State tried to recruit new members even in football. And time and again it carried out attacks on stadiums and sports grounds.
Euphoria after the 2007 Asian Championship
Nevertheless, the Iraqi national team performed surprisingly well at the 2007 Asian Championship, beating the favorites South Korea in the semi-final. Tens of thousands rejoiced in the streets of Baghdad. Then the shock: two suicide bombers mingled with the celebrants and killed more than fifty people.
“The Iraqi players did not want to play the final out of respect for the dead,” recalls journalist Clemens Zavarsky, who covered Iraq for the Austrian magazine Ballesterer. “But relatives of the victims encouraged the players.” Iraq won the final against Saudi Arabia 1-0. A sensational result that gave many Iraqis courage, at least for a few days.
If the Iraqi team were to qualify for the World Cup again after 40 years, the euphoria would probably be even greater than in 2007. Not only in Iraq, but also in the large diaspora. About 5 million people of Iraqi descent live outside of Iraq, 300,000 of them in Germany.
Robert Chatterjee puts it this way: “Iraq could be the team that the entire Arab world emotionally unites around at the World Cup.” It sounds like great expectations, perhaps also pressure. But for the players, after all the dangers and hardships, it would probably be above all a privilege.
