United Arab Emirates national football team

United Arab Emirates

Nickname(s)	Al-Abyad (The Whites), Eyal Zayed (Zayed's Sons)
Association	U.A.E. Football Association
Sub-confederation	WAFF (West Asia)
Confederation	AFC (Asia)
Head coach	Mahdi Ali
Captain	Ali Khasif
Most caps	Adnan Al Talyani (164)
Top scorer	Adnan Al Talyani (53)
Home stadium	Sheikh Zayed Stadium
FIFA code	UAE
FIFA ranking	89
Highest FIFA ranking	42 (November 1998)
Lowest FIFA ranking	138 (January 2012)
Elo ranking	58
Highest Elo ranking	41 (September 1997)
Lowest Elo ranking	151 (September 1981)
First colours Second colours
First international
United Arab Emirates 1–0 Qatar (Saudi Arabia; March 17, 1972)
Biggest win
Brunei 0–12 United Arab Emirates (B. S. Begawan, Brunei; April 14, 2001)
Biggest defeat
United Arab Emirates 0–8 Brazil (Abu Dhabi, UAE; November 12, 2005)
World Cup
Appearances	1 (First in 1990)
Best result	Round 1, 1990
Asian Cup
Appearances	7 (First in 1980)
Best result	Runner-up, 1996
Confederations Cup
Appearances	1 (First in 1997)
Best result	1st round 1997

The United Arab Emirates national football team (Arabic: الامارات العربية المتحدة لكرة القدم‎) represents the United Arab Emirates in association football and is controlled by the United Arab Emirates Football Association, the governing body for football in United Arab Emirates. United Arab Emirates' home ground is Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi. The team is popularly known as Al-Abyad (The Whites).

It has made one World Cup appearance, in 1990 in Italy, but lost all three of its games, to Colombia, West Germany, and Yugoslavia. Two years later the UAE took fourth place in the 1992 Asian Cup, and runner-up in 1996. In both tournaments their final match was lost on penalty kicks. In 2007 the UAE beat Oman 1–0 to win the Gulf Cup for the first time in their history.

FIFA World Cup record

World Cup record
Year	Round	Position	GP	W	D*	L	GS	GA
1930 to 1974	Did not enter	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
1978	Withdrew	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
1982	Did not enter	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
1986	Did not qualify	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
1990	Round 1	24/24	3	0	0	3	2	11
1994 to 2014	Did not qualify	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Total	1/19	Round 1	3	0	0	3	2	11

* Denotes draws include knockout matches decided on penalty kicks.

AFC Asian Cup record

Year	Round	GP	W	D*	L	GS	GA
1956 to 1976	Did not enter	-	-	-	-	-	-
1980	Round 1	4	0	1	3	3	9
1984	Round 1	4	2	0	2	3	8
1988	Round 1	4	1	0	3	2	4
1992	Fourth place	3	1	2	0	2	1
1996	Runners-Up	6	4	2	0	8	3
2000	Did not qualify	-	-	-	-	-	-
2004	Round 1	3	0	1	2	1	5
2007	Round 1	3	1	0	2	3	6
2011	Round 1	3	0	1	2	0	4
2015	In progress	-	-	-	-	-	-
Total	8/15	30	9	7	14	22	40

• Red border color indicates tournament was held on home soil.

Gulf Cup of Nations record

Winner of the 2013 edition

Year	Host Country	Place
1970	Bahrain	Did not enter
1972	Saudi Arabia	Third place
1974	Kuwait	4th place
1976	Qatar	Third place
1979	Iraq	6th place
1982	UAE	Third place
1984	Oman	4th place
1986	Bahrain	Runner-up
1988	Saudi Arabia	Runner-up
1990	Kuwait	5th place
1992	Qatar	4th place
1994	UAE	Runner-up
1996	Oman	4th place
1998	Bahrain	Third place
2002	Saudi Arabia	6th place
2003	Kuwait	5th place
2004	Qatar	Group Stage
2007	UAE	Champion
2009	Oman	Group Stage
2010	Yemen	Semi-Final
2013	Bahrain	Champion

FIFA Confederations Cup

FIFA Confederations Cup record
Year	Round	Position	Pld	W	D *	L	GF	GA	Squad
1992	Did Not Qualify
1995
1997	Group Stage	6th	3	1	0	2	2	8	Squad
1999	Did Not Qualify
2001
2003
2005
2009
2013
2017	To Be Determined
2021
Total	Group Stage	1/9	3	1	0	2	2	8	-

Achievements

• Asian Cup: Runner-up 1996
• Kirin Cup Winners 2005
• Gulf Cup of Nations: Winners 2007, 2013
• Asian Games: Runners-up 2010

Coaches

Bruno Metsu, the former manager of the United Arab Emirates.

Manager	From	To
Mohammed Sheita	1972	1973
Jumaa Gharib	1973	1973
Mohammed Sheita	1973	1974
Mimi El-Sherbini	1975	1975
Jumaa Gharib	1975	1976
Dimitri Tadić	1976	1976
Don Revie	1977	1980
Heshmat Mohajerani	1980	1984
Carlos Alberto Parreira	1984	1988
Mario Zagallo	1988	1990
Bernhard Blaut	1990	1990
Valery Lobanovsky	1990	1992
Antoni Piechniczek	1992	1995
Tomislav Ivić	1995	1996
Lori Sandri	1997	1997
Milan Máčala	1997	1997
Lori Sandri	1998	1998
Carlos Queiroz	1998	Sept 1999
Srećko Juričić	1999	1999
Abdullah Masfar	2000	2000
Henri Michel	2000	2001
Abdullah Saqr	2001	2001
Tini Ruijs	2001	2001
Jo Bonfrere	Nov 2001	Jan 2002 (Gulf Cup campaign)
Roy Hodgson	Apr 2002	Jan 2004
Aad De Mos	2004	2005
Dick Advocaat	Aug 2005	Sep 2005 (clause in contract allowing him to leave)
Bruno Metsu	2006	September 2008
Dominique Bathenay	September 2008	June 2009
Srečko Katanec	June 2009	September 2011
Abdullah Masfar	September 2011	August 2012
Mahdi Ali	August 2012

Players

Current squad

Match Date: 6 February 2013
Opposition: Vietnam (2015 AFC Asian Cup qualification)
Caps and goals correct as of: 18 January 2013

No. Pos. Player Date of Birth (age) Club 1 1GK Ali Khasif (c) (1987-06-09)9 June 1987 (aged 25) Al-Jazira 2 3MF Mohamed Fawzi (1990-02-22)22 February 1990 (aged 22) Baniyas 3 2DF Walid Abbas (1985-06-11)11 June 1985 (aged 27) Al Shabab Al Arabi 4 3MF Habib Fardan (1990-11-11)11 November 1990 (aged 22) Al Nasr 5 3MF Amer Abdulrahman (1989-07-03)3 July 1989 (aged 21) Baniyas 6 2DF Mohanad Salem (1985-03-01)1 March 1985 (aged 27) Al Ain 7 4FW Ali Mabkhout (1990-10-05)5 October 1990 (aged 22) Al-Jazira 8 2DF Hamdan Al Kamali (1989-05-02)2 May 1989 (aged 23) Al-Wahda 9 3MF Abdulaziz Hussain (1990-09-10)10 September 1990 (aged 22) Al Ahli 10 4FW Ismail Matar (1983-04-07)7 April 1983 (aged 29) Al-Wahda 11 4FW Ahmed Khalil (1991-06-08)8 June 1991 (aged 21) Al-Ahli 12 1GK Khalid Eisa (1989-09-15)15 September 1989 (aged 23) Al-Jazira 13 3MF Khamis Esmaeel (1989-08-16)16 August 1989 (aged 23) Al-Jazira 14 2DF Abdelaziz Sanqour (1989-05-07)7 May 1989 (aged 23) Al-Ahli 15 4FW Ismail Al Hammadi (1988-07-01)1 July 1988 (aged 24) Al-Ahli 16 3MF Haboush Saleh (1989-01-01)1 January 1989 (aged 24) Baniyas 17 3MF Majed Hassan (1992-08-01)1 August 1992 (aged 20) Al Ahli 18 2DF Abdullah Mousa (1987-02-23)23 February 1987 (aged 25) Al-Jazira 19 3MF Ali Al-Amri (1989-01-07)7 January 1989 (aged 23) Al-Jazira 20 4FW Saeed Al Kathiri (1988-03-28)28 March 1988 (aged 24) Al-Wahda 21 4FW Omar Abdulrahman (1991-09-20)20 September 1991 (aged 21) Al Ain 22 1GK Dawoud Sulaiman (1990-02-21)21 February 1990 (aged 22) Al Ain 23 2DF Mohamed Ahmed (1989-04-16)16 April 1989 (aged 23) Al Ain

Recent callups

0#0 Pos. Player Date of birth (age) Caps Goals Club 12 1GK Majed Nasser (1984-04-01) 1 April 1984 64 0 Al-Wasl 14 2DF Bashir Saeed (1981-06-28) 28 June 1981 57 5 Al-Ahli 17 2DF Yousif Jaber (1985-02-25) 25 February 1985 42 2 Baniyas 6 2DF Fares Juma Al Saadi (1988-12-30)30 December 1988 (aged 22) 31 2 Al Ain 20 2DF Obaid Khalifa (1985-04-13) 13 April 1985 7 0 Al-Ahli 2 2DF Yaqoub Al Hosani (1987-01-06) 6 January 1987 1 0 Al-Wahda 21 2DF Eisa Ahmed (1987-01-13) 13 January 1987 3 0 Al-Wahda 4 3MF Abdulsalam Jumaa (1977-05-23) 23 May 1977 49 3 Al-Dhafra 7 3MF Ali Al-Wehaibi (1983-10-27) 27 October 1983 46 4 Al Ain 13 3MF Salem Abdullah (1986-07-05) 5 July 1986 2 0 Al Ain 5 3MF Adel Abdullah Abbas (1980-07-03) 3 July 1980 1 0 Al Shabab Al Arabi 23 3MF Adnan Hussain (1985-12-06) 6 December 1985 1 0 Baniyas 16 3MF Humaid Ahmed (1988-02-07) 7 February 1988 0 0 Al Sharjah 9 4FW Mohamed Al-Shehhi (1988-03-28) 28 March 1988 57 12 Al Wahda 11 4FW Essa Obaid (1984-04-10) 10 April 1984 2 0 Al Shabab Al Arabi 19 4FW Abdullah Qasem (1986-08-11) 11 August 1986 2 0 Al Jazira 6 4FW Abdulaziz Fayez (1990-06-17) 17 June 1990 1 0 Al Ain 15 4FW Majed Hassan (1992-08-01) 1 August 1992 0 0 Al-Ahli

Records

Most Caps

#	Player	Caps	Goals	Career
1	Adnan Al Talyani	164	53	1984–1997
2	Subait Khater	120	11	1999–2012
3	Abdulrahim Jumaa	116	13	1998–2009
4	Zuhair Bakheet	112	27	1988–2002
=	Abdulsalam Jumaa	112	??	1997–2010
6	Muhsin Musabah	105	0	1988–1999
7	Mohammed Omar	102	28	1996–2009

See also

• United Arab Emirates national under-23 football team
• United Arab Emirates national under-20 football team
• United Arab Emirates national under-17 football team

Historical Kits

1990 Home	1990 Away	1990 Away	1992 Asian Cup Home	1994 Asian Games Home	1994 Asian Games Away

Controversy

In October 2012 the Asian Football Confederation official website published an article about the UAE national team's bid to qualify for the 2015 AFC Asian Cup, in which the team was referred to as the "Sand Monkeys." This was the indirect result of vandalism to the Wikipedia article on the team, and the AFC was forced to apologise for what was perceived as a racist slur.

External links

• UAE Football Association official website (Arabic)