Qatar’s initial ever tournament match resulted in dismay for AN overmatched team and with an area in unwanted association football history.
The controversy-laced tournament opened Sunday with Qatar obtaining outplayed and embarrassed in an exceedingly 2-0 loss to Ecuador before of sixty-seven,372 fans at Al Bayt sports stadium.
In ninety-two years of soccer’s biggest event, a bunch of teams had ne’er lost their gap game.
The first tournament within the geographic area may be a likelihood for Qatar, a little Arab country jutting out into the gulf, to showcase itself to the broader world. Its association football team, enjoying this level for the primary time by virtue of hosting the tournament, could not live up to the instant as Ecuador captain Enner Valencia scored each goal within the half.
The match came about when a colourful 30-minute gap ceremony — fronted by Oscar-winning actor Morgan freewoman and attended by powerful dignitaries together with Saudi Arabian prince Mohammad bin Salman —promoted inclusivity and world living “under one tent.”
For many, that will jar with this tournament being hosted by AN emirate wherever homosexual acts square measure misappropriated, one that has returned below sturdy criticism for the way migrant employees have treated building stadiums and tournament infrastructure since Qatar won the scandal-shrouded select 2010.
The yearslong scrutiny was ne’er aiming to stop simply because play on the sphere finally entered the narrative of a tournament bulldog by human rights controversies.
A win for the host nation would have a minimum of place a good lightweight on Qatar, soccer-wise.
Instead, Qatar’s players, recent from disbursal seven months along in an exceedingly pre-tournament coaching camp below Spanish coach Felix Michael Assat, froze before of AN expectant crowd and a disciplined Ecuador team that may simply cause danger to a lot of high-profile opponents over consequent few weeks.
