Canada’s FIFA World Cup opponents: Everything you need to know about Qatar

Qatar is one of the lesser-known soccer nations competing in the 2026 World Cup, here’s a quick catch up on all things Maroons.

Published Jun 05, 2026  •  Last updated 20 minutes ago  •  3 minute read

Qatar's Akram Afif eyes the ball during a 2026 FIFA World Cup Asian Qualifier football match against Iran. AFP via Getty Images

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The hosts of the previous World Cup will now be the visitors for the 2026 edition when Qatar takes on Canada.

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Both nations will be looking for better showings than they had in 2022, giving them some extra interest in this match.

Considering Qatar is one of the lesser-known soccer nations competing in the World Cup, here’s a quick catch up on all things Maroons.

Where and when is the match?

In each team’s second game of the group stage, Canada will face the tiny Gulf nation of Qatar on Thursday, June 18 at 6 p.m. in Vancouver.

It will be Canada’s first of potentially three in Vancouver, where the national team has set up its base camp for easy travel.

How did Qatar qualify and what is their history?

While the Maroons played in their first-ever World Cup as hosts in 2022, this is their first time officially qualifying for the tournament.

It wasn’t easy, either. Qatar scraped through the fourth round of AFC qualifying, sealing its spot with a 2-1 win over United Arab Emirates in October after drawing with Oman.

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However, since securing qualification, things haven’t been going well for the Qataris. They went winless in three games at the Arab Cup in December 2025 and had three friendlies cancelled due to the ongoing war in the Middle East.

Who are their key players?

Akram Afif is hard to miss on the pitch, both for his long, curly hair and for his outstanding skill. The forward is a four-time player of the year in Qatar Stars League and one of the best players that the country has produced. He’ll need to be a sparkplug in attack for the team to have any hopes.

The other man to watch for in Qatar’s attack is Almoez Ali. Born in Sudan, Ali is Qatar’s all-time leading international goal scorer with 60 goals in 125 appearances for the Maroons. However, he has been dealing with injury for most of the season only returned to action with his club team in April.

At the back, Qatar relies on a veteran centre back pairing of Boualem Khoukhi and Pedro Miguel – better known as Ro-Ro. The two 35-year-old teammates with Al Sadd have a combined 212 caps with the national team while Khoukhi also has notched an impressive 20 international goals in his career.

Scouting report

The Maroons will be led by manager Julen Lopetegui, who is perhaps best known for being fired as Spain’s manager days before the 2018 World Cup in Russia after word got out that he had accepted a job at Real Madrid for after the tournament. That gig didn’t work out too well for him, either, with Lopetegui being fired after just 14 games in charge.

He has been in charge of Qatar’s national team since May 2025 and has selected a team made up almost entirely of players from the Qatar Stars League. In fact, only Homam Ahmed plays his club football outside of the country while on loan at Cultural Leonesa in Spain’s second division.

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Given its lack of overall talent, Qatar is likely to line up on a conservative 5-4-1 formation and predominantly look to counter-attack when the opportunity arises. How successful it is at doing that will determine if the team can pick up its first-ever point(s) at World Cup.

What can Canada expect against Qatar?

Les Rouges rightfully are a heavy favourite to beat Qatar, which comes into the tournament ranked No. 55 in the world by FIFA.

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Statistically, Qatar was the lone nation to rank worse than Canada during the 2022 World Cup, but we should see a big gulf of quality between the two sides in this match.

This is should be seen as opportunity for Canada to put on a big showing on home soil and really build some momentum going forward. Dropping points in this game could be catastrophic to its hopes of advancing.

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