Felix Sanchez, the patriarch of Qatar’s football family
Doha, Qatar - Qatar’s footballers call the national team a “family” and coach Felix Sanchez is the patriarch who has guided raw young players to be ready for a World Cup battle.
Under Sanchez, Qatar have already caused a major surprise once at a major tournament in the Middle East, beating Japan 31 in the final to take the Asian Cup in 2019.
Now, under their 46-year-old taskmaster, the Al Annabi (burgundy) are dreaming again.
The Spaniard has spent 16 years coaching at various levels in Qatar, having learned his trade over 10 years with Barcelona’s youth teams, just like Luis Enrique and Pep Guardiola.
Sanchez arrived in Qatar in 2006 to join the Gulf state’s Aspire Academy, where young athletes are nurtured in the hope that they will become world beaters.
“I felt privileged at Barcelona, but I could see that I would not grow any more as a coach there,” Sanchez told the Spanish football magazine Panenka in 2019.
Ambitious Aspire
Sanchez was invited to Qatar by Josep Colomer, the former chief of Barcelona’s training centre who had become head of recruit
ment at Aspire. Sanchez could see “a path to progress”.
Students live at the Aspire Academy so Sanchez made his
football proteges train twice a day. “More than was normal in Europe,” he said.
In 2010, Qatar made football history when it was awarded the 2022 World Cup.
Sanchez and his Spanish assistants Sergio Alegre, Alberto Mendez-villanueva and Carlos Domenech Monforte were given the task of guiding a new generation of footballers.
Sanchez took over the national under-19 team in 2013 and won the Asian title with them a
year later. Five of the players were in the side that he first
I felt privileged at Barcelona, but I could see that I would not grow any more as a coach there
FELIX SANCHEZ
managed at Aspire.
He later took on the under-20 side, the under 23s and became coach of the national side in 2017. Winning the Asian Cup has bolstered Qatar’s hopes that they can get past the group stage
when the World Cup starts on November 20.
It will be a tough call against the Netherlands, Senegal and Ecuador, who they play in the tournament’s opening match.
Sanchez’s tactic of keeping the squad secluded in Europe since June has had mixed results so far.