Bassam Al-Rawi

Bassam Al-Rawi
	Bassam celebrating Qatar's victory in the 2019 AFC Asian Cup Final
Personal information
Full name	Bassam Hisham Ali Musa Al-Rawi
Date of birth	16 December 1997 (age 27)
Place of birth	Baghdad, Iraq
Height	1.75 m (5 ft 9 in)
Position(s)	Centre back, right back
Team information
Current team	Al-Duhail
Number	5
Youth career
0000–2015	Al-Rayyan
Senior career*
Years	Team
2015–2017	Al-Rayyan
2016	→ Celta Vigo B (loan)
2016–2017	→ Eupen B (loan)
2017–	Al-Duhail
2018	Al-Duhail B
2023–2024	→ Al-Rayyan (loan)
International career‡
2015–2016	Qatar U20
2016–2017	Qatar U23
2017–	Qatar
Medal record
Representing Qatar
Men's Football
AFC Asian Cup
	*Club domestic league appearances and goals, correct as of 5 December 2023 (UTC); ‡ National team caps and goals, correct as of 7 January 2024 (UTC)

Bassam Hisham Ali Musa Al-Rawi (Arabic: بَسَّام هِشَام عَلِيّ مُوسَى الرَّاوِي; born 16 December 1997) is a professional footballer who plays as a defender for Al-Duhail and the Qatar national football team. Born in Iraq, he represents the Qatar national team.

Personal life

Born in Iraq, Bassam was naturalized to represent the Qatar national team.^[3]^[4] Bassam's father, Hisham Ali Al-Rawi, played for the Iraq national football team in the 1990s.^[5] His brother Ahmed is also a footballer. Bassam attended school in Qatar before being admitted to the Aspire Academy.^[6]

International career

2019 AFC Asian Cup

Bassam made his appearance for Qatar in a 0-1 loss to Czech Republic in Abdullah bin Khalifa Stadium. He was included in Félix Sánchez Bas' Qatari squad for the 2019 AFC Asian Cup in the United Arab Emirates.^[7] He made his first international goal on 9 January 2019 against Lebanon. On 22 January, he scored his second international and the winning goal for Qatar against his country of origin, Iraq, which helped his team reach the quarter-finals of the competition.^[8]^[9] His team would eventually conquer the Asian title for the first time.

Eligibility dispute

On 30 January 2019, soon after the 2019 Asian Cup semi-final tie between the UAE and Qatar, which Qatar won 4–0, the UAE Football Association lodged a formal appeal to the on the fact that Bassam did not qualify to play for Qatar on residency grounds of the Article 7 of the FIFA statutes, which states a player's eligibility to play for a representative team if he has "lived continuously for at least five years after reaching the age of 18 on the territory of the relevant association".^[10] It was claimed that Bassam had not lived continuously in Qatar for at least five years over the age of 18.^[11] On 1 February 2019, the AFC Disciplinary and Ethics Committee dismissed the protest lodged by the United Arab Emirates Football Association.^[12]^[13]

Career statistics

International

As of 12 July 2023

Year	Apps	Goals
Qatar
2017	3	0
2018	10	0
2019	14	2
2021	22	0
2022	7	0
2023	4	0
Total	60	2

International goals

Scores and results list Qatar's goal tally first.^[14]

No.	Date	Venue	Opponent	Score	Result	Competition
1.	9 January 2019	Hazza bin Zayed Stadium, Al Ain, United Arab Emirates	Lebanon	1–0	2–0	2019 AFC Asian Cup
2.	22 January 2019	Al Nahyan Stadium, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates	Iraq	1–0	1–0	2019 AFC Asian Cup