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For the uninitiated or the cynic Palestine’s 4-1 loss to Iran could be easily dismissed. Palestine after all has always been the team the neutral has gravitated to. The plucky underdog that should just be happy to be at a continental showpiece.
“I want to show the world that Palestine has good players! Then this happens” lamented a fellow journalist in the media tribune on Sunday night.
It can sometimes feel like we are stuck in the same cycle of mediocrity- especially when it comes to the Asian Cup Finals. That felt like the case last week when the kit was changed at the last minute and the buffoon-in-chief decided to embarrass himself and the nation in front of the entire Arab World.
On January 9th, PFA President Jibril Rajoub was a guest on Al-Kass’s popular football talks how Al-Majlis. In his typically brash style he found a way to dismiss the catalyst and inflection point of Palestinian Football.
“Why do you want to conduct an interrogation with me?!” barked the 70 year old at the show’s presenter Khaled Al-Jassim.
The conversation then drifted to how Palestine qualified for their first Asian Cup and how it set the team up for a decade of success. Al-Jassim rightly praised the work of Jamal Mahmoud only for the PFA President to lash out:
“We had a sporting infrastructure behind him, we would and could have succeeded without him.” Rajoub retorted.
The former Palestinian Authority Chief of Internal Security scion went on narrating his own alternate version of events perhaps still stung by the lawsuit he lost which forced him to pay Jamal Mahmoud’s unpaid wages plus compensation.
This really is not about correcting the record. The facts can speak for themselves and data will show that Jamal Mahmoud left the national team in a far better state than he found it.
Two decisions taken in 2013 would alter the trajectory of the national team forever. In April of that year- Musab Al-Battat made his debut for the national team in a 2-0 friendly loss against Qatar. He was 19 years old. Another 19 year old- Rami Hamadi- would make his (albeit unofficial) debut in August of that year replacing Ramzi Saleh in goal. When it came time to plot a path to the Asian Cup a pair of debuts were handed to Tamer Seyam and the now exiled Abdallah Jaber.
Nearly ten years on a new history of the national team has been written by this quartet. Abdallah Jaber played every minute of the 2015 and 2019 AFC Asian Cup finals. Musab Al-Battat is now the captain of the team. Tamer Seyam is close to being the team’s all-time top goalscorer. Rami Hamadi who was the youngest member of the 2015 AFC Asian Cup is now a grizzled veteran who has been able to maintain clean sheets in over half of his 45 games.
All these players will be amongst Palestine’s ten most capped players when the tournament is over. Tamer Seyam has the fourth most caps in national team history. Al-Battat is fifth in that category.
The question must be asked: If Palestine does not qualify for the 2015 AFC Asian Cup does any of this happen? Do these players go on to have such illustrious careers? Does the next generation get the funding and support it needed in order to qualify for the U23 Asian Cup three years later?
What happens to that generation? By Mohammed Rashid’s own admission he probably would be working in Human Resources.
Does Oday Dabbagh go to Kuwait and then Europe?
The answer is no- none of that happens. The players who powered the initial success are now a part of history. A history which some of our younger readers do not even recall. Perhaps they remember Abdelatif Bahdari and Ashraf Nu’man but do they remember Ramzi Saleh, Omar Jarun, Imad Zatara, Haitham Dheeb, Khaled Mahdi, Murad Ismail, Khader Yousef, and Abdelhamid Abuhabib?
Perspective is important in football. It is a long journey with many ups and downs and for most of the ninety minutes against Iran it was down. Take a step back though and you will realize how far this team has come and how the kids of ten years ago are now the men leading Al-Fida’i forward.
