Abdulrahman Saad looks forward to lead fully prepared Qatar at FIBA Asia Cup Qualifiers

DOHA (Qatar) - Qatar were unable to qualify for the FIBA Basketball World Cup 2019, losing their final two games left at home in the final window of the Asian Qualifiers against the Philippines and Japan. Star guard Abdulrahman Saad has been sidelined with injuries after averaging 16.2 points, 5.5 rebounds, and 2.7 assists per contest in his first 6 games.

"We have to stay together no matter who’s missing. We have to play as a team and get better day by day."
- Abdulrahman Saad

 

"Getting injured at that time was bad because it was in the middle of the games that I wanted to play,” Saad expresses. The 6 games he missed were two games each against Australia, Japan, and the Philippines.

“But the only thing I was thinking about was how to get better and bounce back stronger than before."

The lone couple of wins that Qatar managed to secure in the Asian Qualifiers were against Iraq. Aside from a slim 2-point loss to Iran at home, Qatar have struggled against their opposing teams. It’s been a mix of missing key players and personnel changes that have been Qatar’s major hurdle this past year.

"I think we were unlucky in the Asian Qualifiers because we never played as a full team,” said Saad. “There were always significant players missing so hopefully we can get healthy and get back to playing together more often."

Only two players played in all 12 games for Qatar so far, while key contributors like Saad, Clinton Johnson, Tanguy Ngombo, and Erfan Saeed missed large chunks of available games as well.

Couple that with a coaching change from Tim Lewis to Panayiotis Yiannaras and it becomes clear that things weren’t going the way Qatar had planned. The Asian Qualifiers ended on a disappointing note for the Qatari team, but there is hope that they can turn it around for the FIBA Asia Cup Qualifiers later this year.

"It's been great experience,” Saad says. “Unfortunately, we weren’t able to show our best due to some reasons but hopefully we can have the same experience again and do even better."

 

There is plenty of time from now until the FIBA Asia Cup Qualifiers and Saad hopes the team can utilize this time properly to get prepared. The 22-year-old guard most likely wants nothing more than to qualify to the FIBA Asia Cup again, where he recorded a superb 20.0 points, 6.3 rebounds, and 3.0 assists in the 2017 edition of the competition.

"As a team, I think we need to be together for more time to be able to understand our roles perfectly and to play friendly tournaments to get us better as a team," Saad says.

Saad himself needs to start getting used to his role as well, as the cornerstone of the Qatar national team future. He has already solidified himself as one of the best guards in Asia, so he needs to start overtaking leadership responsibilities despite being one of the younger guys on the team.

"We have to stay together no matter who’s missing. We have to play as a team and get better day by day."

FIBA