Abu Dhabi: The UAE face Iraq in Qatar tonight (5.45pm) in a crucial match in the Asian qualifiers for the 2012 London Olympic Games.
With Uzbekistan leading Group B on five points from three matches, the UAE will be looking to kick-start their qualification campaign after failing to score so far, leaving them three points behind at the foot of the table.
Goalless draws against Australia and the Uzbeks and a 2-0 defeat against Iraq is all the UAE have managed so far, as they look to qualify for the Olympics for the first time.
The team arrived in Doha four days ago after a short training camp in Saudi Arabia and Bahrain, where they scored confidence-boosting friendly wins over both countries, 2-1 and 3-0 respectively.
Big problem
Head coach Mahdi Ali faces a big problem in the absence of top scorer Ahmad Khalil through injury and captain Hamdan Al Kamali, who recently signed for French team Lyon.
Ali Mabkhoot and Ahmad Ali will lead the attack after proving themselves in the friendly matches.
"We are determined to win our remaining three matches and win promotion to the finals of football in the Olympic Games," said right back Abdul Aziz Haikal.
"We will start realising this dream from this match.
"We miss two of our key players but all the 24 players selected by the coach are ready and capable to represent their country.
"We all know the importance of winning the match and the strength of our opponents but we have confidence in ourselves and we have proved in earlier competitions what we can do."
The Olympic team won the Asian Youth Championship in 2008, finished eighth in the Fifa Youth World Cup in 2009, won the GCC Under-23 Championship in 2010 and an Asian Games silver medal in China the same year.
Also tonight, Uzbekistan host Australia in Tashkent.
