Dubai:
Asia’s best footballer has next set his sights on qualifying for the 2018 Fifa World Cup.
The UAE and Al Ahli striker Ahmad Khalil landed at Terminal 3 of the Dubai International Airport in the early hours of Monday after being voted as the Asian Player of the Year at an impressive presentation ceremony held in New Delhi late on Sunday.
Khalil edged out national teammate Omar Abdul Rahman and China’s Zheng Zhi for the continent’s highest prize in football.
“Winning this award is a dream come true for me. When I was small and just started playing for my club [Al Ahli] I used to visualise myself at being the best. Winning the best player in Asia was part of the dream for sure and I am thankful to God, my family, my club and my friends for helping me reach this dream,” Khalil told Gulf News.
The Emirates flight from New Delhi was delayed by an hour due to fog conditions that did not allow take-off yesterday morning. Though looking a bit tired and drained, Khalil was received at the VIP Majlis by Ahmad Khalifa Hamad, CEO, Al Ahli Club along with a handful of other officials and the player’s immediate family, including older bothers Fahad and Faisal.
The 24-year-old patiently did all television interviews and then turned his attention to the written media.
“The feeling is something that I find difficult to put in words. But let me start by saying that this is so much part of a bigger dream for me, for my club and for my country,” Khalil related.
“I represent the UAE, and it is with this thought in mind that I feel we should collectively aim for our next goal together — qualifying for the World Cup in 2018. Every day of my life as a footballer and professional player I want to be better. I want to work hard and improve so that one day we can make the people of the UAE happy by qualifying for the World Cup,” he added.
A crucial part of the golden generation of UAE footballers, Khalil is not new to success, be it with the age-level national squads or his club Al Ahli. He started off with the squad that won the U17 Gulf Cup in 2006 and then followed this up with a quarter-finals at the Fifa U20 World Cup in Egypt in 2009.
As a 19-year-old, Khalil was part of the UAE junior team that won silver medal at the 2010 Guangzhou Asian Games and in the same year he won the U23 Gulf Cup, while scoring five goals for the UAE to bag the topscorer prize. Since 2008, Khalil has had 73 UAE appearances with 37 goals against his name so far.
“Three years down the road I want to be in Russia playing at the World Cup,” Khalil continued.
“The current squad is called the golden generation due to the regional and continental medals we have won so far. But the real test for us will be on the world stage and qualifying to the World Cup will be so much part of the bigger dream,” he added.
“There is a belief among all of us in the national squad that we can achieve this dream. I trust myself and my teammates to work hard in the next few months and achieve this goal.”
