Wednesday, July 10, 2013

Iraq's Under-20 team bringing smiles to the faces of people back home...

On Saturday night, Ali Yaseen was part of the Iraq squad that stunned South Korea on penalties to reach the semi-finals of the Under-20 World Cup in Turkey. On Sunday morning his club back in Iraq, Karbala, announced that their coach, Mohammed Abbas al-Jabouri, had died from the injuries suffered in an attack by anti-terrorism police during a match the previous weekend.

Yaseen, 19, had taken his place on the bench for the game in the knowledge that his coach was in a coma and that seven of his team-mates had been injured in the attack, several of them critically. He knew, too, that if he had not been selected for the Under-20 World Cup, he would most probably have been playing in the match against Al-Quwa Al-Jawiya and could, quite possibly, have ended up in hospital with life-threatening injuries.

Saturday going into Sunday, joy turning to misery. That weekend 10 days ago summed up football – and life – in Iraq. Terror, uncertainty, despair, death – and the very occasional glimmer of hope. How the Iraqi Under-20 team out in Turkey are able to focus on the football is difficult to comprehend, especially as the players were around eight or nine when their country was invaded. Most of their lives have been spent in the dark shadow of war.

The day after Abbas died, AFP reported that a string of attacks across Iraq had killed 15 people, including nine in a bombing at a popular football pitch in the Nahrawan neighbourhood of southeast Baghdad. Most of the victims were said to be under the age of 16. Full story...

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