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AFC-NET
http://www.asian-football.com/

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IRAQ’S national football team will be reassembled and begin training this week for upcoming international competitions including qualifiers for next year's Olympic Games, Associated Press reports.

Assistant coach Adnan Hamad has reportedly urged all members of the former national team, which disintegrated in the run-up to the war, to show up at Baghdad's al-Karkh stadium in the coming days and weeks in preparation for the postponed Olympic qualifier against Vietnam, due to be played in September.

"We will train four times a week to be ready for the matches," Hamad said. "Iraq will be fully prepared for the Olympic qualifiers."

A friendly between two popular teams, al-Zawra and Police, has been delayed twice in the past week and is now tentatively scheduled for Friday. It will be the first professional match held since the war.

The end of the war in Iraq has been welcomed by the world soccer community, which says it wants to get the football-mad country reintegrated into international competitions as soon as possible. But all contact with the Iraq Football Association has been broken since before the start of the conflict.

"The Asian Football Confederation and FIFA are extremely relieved that the war in Iraq has ended and the reconstruction of the country has begun," Peter Velappan, AFC General Secretary, has said. "Both the AFC and FIFA would like reconstruction of football facilities to be done throughout the country so that people can get back to football."

The team is currently managed by German coach Bernd Stange, who left Baghdad when the conflict broke out and has not returned. The promise of competitive football in the shape of an Olympic qualifying campaign could be all the encouragement he needs to return to the helm.

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Direct Link:
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