Iraq celebrated their first home soccer match since 2002 by defeating Palestine 3-0 in a friendly on Friday.
About 25,000 fans, many waving Iraq and Palestine flags and chanting “Iraq, Iraq” packed Fransou Hariri Stadium for a game that was as much about the nation’s struggle for stability as it was about sports.
Some fans sat on the roofs of nearby buildings to catch a glimpse of the match in the capital of a Kurd-ruled region that is safer than many other parts of Iraq.
PHOTO: AFP
Palestine planned to fly to Baghdad for a second friendly tomorrow, even though the capital was caught up in a deadly wave of bombings on Thursday.
CLEAR MESSAGE
“The holding of this match in Irbil gives a clear message to the world that Iraq is recovering and security is prevailing,” Hussein Saeed, head of the Iraqi Football Federation, told the crowd before the game. “We are here today because football is the message of love.”
Iraq last played a home game on July 22, 2002, when they beat Syria 2-1 in Baghdad. The country sank into chaos after the US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003, but has made gains in security after years of insurgent attacks and sectarian violence.
GOALS
On Friday, Hawar Mulla Mohammed scored in the 20th minute from a corner and Ahmed Younis made it 2-0 with a header, then Louai Salah capped the scoring in the second half.
Iraqi fan Faris Abdul-Amir, along with his wife and mother, came from the southern city of Karbala to support the national team in Irbil.
HAPPY
“I am very happy to see our national team playing on Iraqi soil for the first time in years,” he said. “In the past, we were deprived from watching our team playing in front of us.”
Iraq, known as the “Lions of the Two Rivers” in a reference to the Tigris and Euphrates, reached the Asian Cup final in 2007 and scored a stunning 1-0 victory over three-time champions Saudi Arabia.
The win set off wild rejoicing in Iraq, which at the time was experiencing some of its worst violence.
Bayer 04 Leverkusen go into today’s match at TSG 1899 Hoffenheim stung from their first league defeat in 16 months. Leverkusen were beaten 3-2 at home by RB Leipzig before the international break, the first loss since May last year for the reigning league and cup champions. While any defeat, particularly against a likely title rival, would have disappointed coach Xabi Alonso, the way in which it happened would be most concerning. Just as they did in the Supercup against VfB Stuttgart and in the league opener to Borussia Moenchengladbach, Leverkusen scored first, but were pegged back. However, while Leverkusen rallied late to
If all goes well when the biggest marathon field ever gathered in Australia races 42km through the streets of Sydney on Sunday, World Marathon Majors (WMM) will soon add a seventh race to the elite series. The Sydney Marathon is to become the first race since Tokyo in 2013 to join long-established majors in New York, London, Boston, Berlin and Chicago if it passes the WMM assessment criteria for the second straight year. “We’re really excited for Sunday to arrive,” race director Wayne Larden told a news conference in Sydney yesterday. “We’re prepared, we’re ready. All of our plans look good on
The lights dimmed and the crowd hushed as Karoline Kristensen entered for her performance. However, this was no ordinary Dutch theater: The temperature was 80°C and the audience naked apart from a towel. Dressed in a swimsuit and to the tune of emotional music, the 21-year-old Kristensen started her routine, performed inside a large sauna, with a bed of hot rocks in the middle. For a week this month, a group of wellness practitioners, called “sauna masters,” are gathering at a picturesque health resort in the Netherlands to compete in this year’s Aufguss world sauna championships. The practice takes its name from a
When details from a scientific experiment that could have helped clear Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva landed at the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the leader of the organization’s reaction was unequivocal: “We have to stop that urgently,” he wrote. No mention of the test ever became public and Valieva’s defense at the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) went on without it. What effect the information could have had on Valieva’s case is unclear, but without it, the skater, then 15 years old, was eventually disqualified from the 2022 Winter Olympics after testing positive for a banned heart medication that would later