Women's national football team wins friendly against Eydhafushi

Maldives women’s national football team has won its friendly match against Eydhafushi team on Monday.

The national team won the match played at Eydhafushi’s turf grounds with a three to nil score.

The first two goals of the match were scored by the team’s Raniya Ibrahim, while the third and final goal was by Fathimath Theebaa.

The friendly match is part of the national team's training for the AFC Women’s Asian Cup qualifiers 2022.

Football Association of Maldives (FAM) President Bassam Adeel Jaleel said that the team will depart for a training camp abroad after the friendly, however, no further details have been disclosed yet.

He further revealed work to appoint a foreign coach to the team, with FAM’s Technical Director Ahmed Shareef designated as a temporary instructor until then.

This is the third time that the women’s team will be taking part in the AFC Women’s Asian Cup qualifiers. The last time was 11 years ago, when they took part in 2010 and the first attempt was during 2006.

Womens National Football Team, Photo by FAM

Maldives will play in the qualifying matches in India next year, and is in Group B with Vietnam, Tajikistan and Afghanistan.

While 12 teams will compete in the AFC Women’s Asian Cup, four have already qualified; Australia, China, Japan and host country India. The other eight teams will be decided by qualification. 28 teams have been divided into eight sets with Groups A to D comprising four teams each and Groups E to H drawing three teams. The winners of each group will secure qualification to the AFC Women's Asian Cup India 2022.

While participating in AFC Women’s Asian Cup’s qualifying is a highly applaudable accomplishment, the National Team has achieved some noticeable feats in the past as well. For instance, in 2018, the team played in the International Women’s Quadrangular competition and came in third place. Moreover, in 2019, the team achieved the low medal in South Asian Games’ Women’s Football event. Also, in 2016’s SAFF championship which was held in Bangladesh, the team won matches against Bhutan and Sri Lanka, in turn heading to the semi-finals.