Bahrain National Team

Early time

Despite the first national team was founded in 1959, Bahraini team was only first officially assembled in 1966 where they played a friendly game against Kuwait, where they drew 4-4. At that time, despite being under British rule, Bahrain was given autonomy and they had utilised this opportunity to expand its football development. Nonetheless, Bahrain was regarded as a weaker side in the Gulf Arab region, where it constituted stronger Saudi Arabia, Qatar, UAE and Kuwait. For this reason, Bahrain's international feat had been mostly limited in the Arabian Gulf Cup.

In 1988, Bahrain qualified to its first ever AFC Asian Cup, but finished bottom with only two draws in the 1988 AFC Asian Cup. Since then, Bahraini side remained neglected and less invested, despite its youth successes at the U-17 and U-20. Only by the end of 20th century, Bahrain began to really emerge and would change the country's football history.

Rise

Bahrain managed a fine performance during 2000 AFC Asian Cup qualification and 2002 FIFA World Cup qualification, the latter was the first time Bahrain reached the final round. Despite being unable to reach either of them, Bahrain managed one of their greatest football feats, by beating Iran in both qualifications 1-0 in Damascus in 2000 Asian Cup run, and 3-1 at home in 2002 World Cup run, which remains one of the most embarrassing defeats for Iranian football. 

In the third round of the 2010 World Cup qualifiers, Bahrain were drawn into group B along with Japan, Oman, and Thailand. They finished second overall to qualify to the final round, in which Bahrain finished third overall in their group, below Australia and Japan, but above Uzbekistan and Qatar. In the second leg of the playoff against Saudi Arabia to decide Asia's fifth best team, Bahrain drew 2-2 with Saudi Arabia after scoring in stoppage time which allowed them to go through on away goals, after drawing their home leg 0-0. They went on to play New Zealand in the final playoff in which the victory would qualify them for the World Cup, but after a goalless draw in Manama on 10 October 2009, Bahrain lost the return leg 1-0 in Wellington, missing out on qualification at the last hurdle for the second time running.

In the 2014 FIFA World Cup qualifiers, Bahrain did considerably worse. In the third round, they were drawn against Indonesia, Iran and Qatar. Although they managed to defeat Indonesia both home and away, they also lost 6-0 by Iran away from home, and drew their other 3 games. Although they had a higher goal difference than Qatar, they needed an extra point to advance to the next round, or Qatar had to be beaten by Iran in the final round. If they had also drawn to Iran away from home, they would have advanced. But neither luck came to them, and their campaign ended in the third round, their worst result since the 1998 World Cup qualifiers.

In the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifiers second round, Bahrain finished fourth in a group with Uzbekistan, North Korea, Philippines and Yemen. Later on, Bahrain finished first in the third round in a group with Turkmenistan, Chinese Taipei and Singapore, to qualify to the next AFC Asian Cup.

Present

At the 2019 AFC Asian Cup, Bahrain reached the round of 16, where they lost 2-1 to South Korea after extra time. Afterwards, Bahrain managed to win two competitions for the first time, after defeating both Iraq and Saudi Arabia, 1-0 under the leadership of Hélio Sousa against all odds, in the WAFF Championship and Gulf Cup respectively.