'Don't bet against them': Qatar's World Cup hopes rest on the influence of former Barcelona coach Felix Sanchez as they hope to avoid the undesirable record becoming the first host nation to lose their opening match

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Aside from Qatar’s grubby human rights record and under-the-table corrupt dealings to host this tournament, football fans have objected to the 2022 World Cup on grounds of a lack of sporting heritage, culture and romance.

No nation since 1934 has hosted a World Cup having never played in a finals beforehand. Qatar lacks the storied venues like the Maracanã in Rio de Janeiro or Berlin’s Olympiastadion. And to put it mildly, how many Qatari footballers can you name - past or present?

In 22 attempts, the World Cup hosts have staggeringly never lost the opening game of their home tournament. At a glance, that record looks in grave danger of ending as Qatar host Ecuador on Sunday in Al-Bayt.

Former Barcelona coach Felix Sanchez (pictured) is in charge of the Qatar national side  

Many questions have been raised over Qatar's preparedness to host the 2022 World Cup

But while FIFA’s cabal of crooks straight-batted concerns over treatment of migrant workers and the LGBTQ+ community in the gulf country, Qatar’s football federation set about creating a team ready to compete in 2022, planning long before the gasps of horror as Sepp Blatter revealed a slip of paper announcing them as hosts.

‘Few teams will have prepared for this World Cup as meticulously or for as long as Qatar have,’ says Ali Rea, an expert on Qatari football. ‘The current squad was already being forged before the country was even announced as hosts in 2010.’

Qatar did not want to host the World Cup, they wanted to succeed in it - and money makes their world go round. The hub of that is at Doha’s £1.09billion Aspire Academy. It boasts the largest indoor football dome in the world and has room for science labs specialising in all sorts from altitude to anthropometry, and two hotels - one shaped like a torch.

Sanchez (right) has been working hard at the Aaspire Training Site in Doha to prepare 

Qatar will take on Equador in their opening match of their home World Cup on Sunday 

Its biggest accolade so far came in 2019, when underdogs Qatar won the Asia Cup, beating Japan and Son Heung-min’s South Korea on the way. Seventy per cent of that squad were nurtured at Aspire’s glittering palace, while the website also boasts Olympic medals won by high-jumper Mutaz Barshim.

The mastermind behind Qatar’s rise is Spaniard Felix Sanchez, who was head-hunted in 2006 from a role at Barcelona’s famed La Masia youth academy. He worked his way up from coach of the Under 19s to first-team manager and, with it, has tutored this group of players for more than a decade.

Sanchez was a coach at Barcelona's famed La Masia that has raised some huge talents 

Eighteen of their 26 players at the World Cup were developed at Aspire, with Sanchez’s fingerprints all over it. Their model is heavily based on Spain’s all-conquering side of 2008-12, which won two European Championships and the 2010 World Cup. Qatar’s ultimate dream was to have Barcelona boss Xavi as manager, after he won seven trophies in charge of Al-Sadd.

So if Qatar can build a team from scratch with a bit of good coaching, why can’t any nation? As is the answer to most questions at this World Cup - money talks. Qatar paid huge salaries to global players to star in their domestic league and stay long enough to be eligible for the national team.

Ten of Qatar’s 26 stars at the World Cup were born outside the nation. Defender Ro-Ro, for example, was born in Portugal and played for Benfica before joining Al Ahli in 2011. Karim Boudiaf hails from Parisian suburbs but signed for Al-Duhail in 2010 and now has 115 caps for Qatar.

Qatar will also play Sengal and Holland in their group having also played 31 games since 2021

This process is called mass naturalisation. While we must note 137 players at the World Cup will play for a team that is not their birth nation, the difference is that Qatar basically scouted players and groomed them to the country on big money as part of the ‘Football Dreams Project’.

Aspire have set up satellite academies in Africa, including Senegal - at great expense - and have extensively scouted Asia and Latin America. Their World Cup squad also includes players from Iraq, Egypt, Bahrain, Ghana and Sudan. While Raheem Sterling, for example, moved to England as a child through his family’s choice - and grew up there - most of Qatar’s naturalised players were brought to the country on big salaries and promised the World Cup dream.

Netflix’s new documentary FIFA Uncovered depicts how nations accepted bribes to vote for Qatar to host the World Cup. But Qatar has also used its power to play top-class competition in practice for 2022. They appeared as a ‘ghost team’ in European qualifying, playing the likes of Ireland in Dublin - a 4-0 home win - but did not appear in the standings.

Qatar Airways was unveiled as a major sponsor of both CONMEBOL and CONCACAF - the UEFA equivalents of South and North America - and, as if by magic, the Asian nation appeared in those continents’ tournaments, the 2019 Copa America and the North American Gold Cup last year. To put it lightly, the nation has had esteemed invitations that others have not.

But all this has readied Qatar for hosting the tournament. They are ranked 50th in the world - ahead of Saudi Arabia and Ghana for teams at the World Cup, while Sanchez’s team have played 31 matches since the start of 2021, including five since England’s last game in September, a run which includes four straight runs against the likes of Albania and Honduras.

‘Familiarity is Qatar's strength with five core players reaching over a century of caps together,’ adds Rea. ‘The Qatar Stars League has been on pause since the middle of September as the national team entered an early training camp and a 2-0 defeat to Canada was unnerving.

Qatar drew 2-2 to Chile back in September in a huge draw showing they mean business

‘A 2-2 draw with Chile has renewed optimism and while other leagues have continued apace, the QSL pause has ensured top condition. That allowed buzzing forward Akram Afif time to charge up to his electric best after an injury-hit season. Qatar's biggest challenge will be how they physically compete with their Group A opponents.’

So forgetting how we’ve got here, Qatar seem in good nick. Every host nation bar South Africa has qualified for the next stage at their home World Cup. Qatar, in a group with Ecuador, Netherlands and Senegal, have a mountainous battle to do that, but you wouldn’t bet against them.