Ali Mabhoot will be the UAE’s hope to clear Australia’s hurdle when the two teams meet in Doha on Tuesday in the Asian play-offs for the 2022 FIFA World Cup Qualifier in Qatar, after the “record holder” has always promised milestones.

Mabhoot, 31, is no ordinary player given his scoring and record numbers, he is the top scorer for the UAE national team, local league and Arab players in the Asian Cup.

But qualifying for the World Cup is the missing piece of his career, after he previously tasted the sweetness of qualifying for the London 2012 Olympics but failed to make it to the UAE for the biggest football event of the 2014 and 2018 World Cups. qualifiers.

The Al Jazeera striker wants third place to be recorded, but to achieve his goal, the UAE team must first clear the hurdle of Australia and then Peru in next week’s international playoffs.

“Being 180 minutes away from the World Cup is an opportunity that doesn’t come along very often, it’s in our hands and we don’t have to wait for any other results, all we need to do is focus on facing Australia first in as the final match and do our best,” Mabhoot told FIFA.com. We worked hard throughout the match.”

– Little Italian –

Since starting his career with the island’s first team in 2009, winning the league title three times, Mabhoot has been called the “Little Italian” after the Emirates player of the century, Adnan Al-Taliani, who scored the equalizer against South Korea 1-1 in qualifying matches for the 1990 World Cup, which for the first and only time qualified his country for the World Cup.

Will Mabhut repeat what his idol did 32 years ago?

Mabhut continues: “I don’t like comparisons. Adnan Al Taliani remains a historical name in Emirati football regardless of the numbers. If I can replicate what Al-Taliani did and lead the team to qualify for the World Cup, I will be happy, and also if another player scores and qualifies. We are all looking to raise the Emirates name and their flag in a tournament the size of a championship of the world, which was the same that was the goal for Adnan and his colleagues at the time.”

The ‘apprentice’ Mabhut had previously surpassed the Italian ‘professor’ when he surpassed him as the UAE’s historic goalscorer with 52 goals, and later reached 80 as the highest for a reigning international player, excluding Portuguese Cristiano Ronaldo and Argentine Lionel Messi .

Mabhoot was not satisfied with this after he became the UAE League’s historic top scorer with 181 goals, erasing the previous record of another UAE legend Fahd Khamis of 175 goals.

And because Mabhout never tire of setting records, he is the historical top scorer of the Arabs in the finals of the Asian Cup with 9 goals, only Iranian Ali Daei (14 goals) and South Korean Lee Dong Guk (10 goals) are ahead in the tournament. .

– happy memories –

On the occasion of the match between the UAE and Australia on Tuesday, Mabhoot has always been superb against the latter, and his 2015 AFC Asian Cup is one of his fondest memories.

Mabhoot was the top scorer in the Asian Cup in Australia with 5 goals, becoming the first Emirati player to be honored, and also achieved a unique achievement after being the fastest goal in the history of the tournament after scoring against Bahrain after 14 seconds.

After 4 years, Mabhout returned to score 4 goals in the 2019 Asian Cup in the UAE, including the goal of a 1-0 victory over Australia itself in the quarter-finals, which knocked Al-Abyad out of the semi-finals into the 2015 edition with a 2-0 victory .

Mabhut says, “On a personal level, I am pleased with my performance in 2015 and 2019. The first remains the tournament where I won the top scorer award and introduced the Mabhut to the Asian public, but 2019 was a different year in our land. Despite the disappointing end, reaching the semi-finals twice in a row is marked in our history as players.

And two mutual victories at the Asian Championship between the UAE and Australia is one indicator of the level of convergence of the two teams, according to Mabhoot: “I think the level of the two teams is close, based on our confrontations. in recent years, as well as the fact that both teams finished third in two groups (during qualifying), so we will have to focus and not make mistakes.