World Cup preliminaries have all ended. The Chinese men's football team relied on the help of its rivals in the same group, the Singapore team, to successfully reach the top 18 and did not fall behind early in the process of hitting the World Cup. In this round of 36, there is a team whose performance is completely opposite to that of the national football team. Not only did they become the only three teams to win all the group matches, they also defeated the Saudi team and successfully entered the second tier. . This team is also expected to rewrite 40 years of history and once again enter the World Cup!
I believe fans who watched the round of 36 may be able to guess that this new upstart in Asian football is the Iraqi team from West Asia. The Iraqi team can be regarded as an old rival of the national football team. Although the two sides have no record of playing against each other in recent years, 10 years ago, the national football team repeatedly met the Iraqi team in various competitions, although they could not account for anything each time. Cheap, but it is not that easy for the Iraqi team to successfully defeat the Chinese team.
However, with the continuous decline of Chinese football in recent years, the Iraqi team has left us far behind. In this round of 36, the Iraqi team also showed its strong strength as a top team in Asia. After defeating the Vietnamese team 3-1 in the final round of the group stage, the Iraqi team broke through with an impressive record of winning six games. The only two traditional powerhouses in Asia that can compete with them are Japan and Australia.
's strong performance in the top 36 also helped the Iraqi team's world ranking rise. After the Saudi team suffered an upset loss to Jordan, the Iraqi team has successfully overtaken Saudi Arabia and become the new sixth in Asia. The biggest benefit this ranking brings to the Iraqi team is that they can participate in the next round of 18 draws as the second-tier team in Asia. They also used this to avoid the Australian team and the new Asian champion Qatar team, and the probability of entering the World Cup has also increased a lot.
Looking back at the history of the Iraqi team, the last time they participated in the World Cup was in the distant 1986. The Iraqi team lost all three group matches and was ultimately eliminated with last place. However, in the match against Belgium, the Iraqi team scored its first goal in the World Cup, which can be considered a gain. Now that the World Cup is ushering in an expansion, the Iraqi team also sees the best opportunity to return to the World Cup. If they can continue their outstanding performance in the top 36 in the next round of 18, then this West Asian powerhouse is expected to stand on the World Cup stage again after 40 years!
Due to the different gears, the Iraqi team has a high probability of being divided into the same group as the Chinese team in the next round of 18. I wonder how the Chinese men’s football team will perform when the two teams compete again?
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