By Paul Nicholson
December 4 – Put aside winter or summer 2022 and overseas players’ contracts and workers’ rights generally - big issues that have to be dealt with – what else is happening in Qatar? Is there actually any football being played or is that on hold until 2022?
Ivan Bravo, director general of Qatar’s Aspire Academy, argues that there is plenty of football and that there is a football culture being built. Most importantly, he says, it must be a sustainable football culture.
It will surprise many who hold the belief that football in Qatar is only played by foreign players looking for a big tax-free pay day, that Bravo’s Aspire Academy is now supplying significant numbers of local players to professional clubs.
“We now have six graduating classes in the pro ranks. That is 40-plus players already with the oldest being 23 years of age. In five years time we will have 80,” said Bravo.
“You can expect 75% of the leading players in the clubs and in the Senior National Team to come from our Academy in future. We have eight players in the Qatar national senior team and 95% of the Qatar Under 21 team come from Aspire.”
While international uproar rages over the kafala system for foreign workers and international players’ union FIFPro’s insistence that players are given more basic rights within their contracts have dominated headlines, it is clear from Bravo’s comments that Qatar’s national league is turning from a ‘manufactured’ one based on overseas players, to one that is built on local talent.
For Bravo it is about building a football model that works and making that model self-fulfilling.
“Every club in the world has a different perspective or strategic positioning. Real Madrid can spend €90 million on Gareth Bale and that makes sense to them. If Tottenham Hotspur spent €90 million on a player they would be bankrupt” said Bravo, and he knows a bit about Real Madrid as he was strategy director at the club before taking up the position in Qatar.
“A club like Real Madrid is tightly identified and rooted in the DNA of the city, but has built its leadership within football’s pecking order by having the world’s best players and thus attracting a global fan base. This makes for a profitable club and of course, with financial fair play in Europe this sustainable financial model is more important than ever.
“Other clubs should probably not copy that model. The likes of Man City, Inter Milan or Monaco can successfully leverage their own strengths – winning history, traditions, regional roots – towards their relevant fan base,” said Bravo.
The Qatar model is on a different scale. “We always start with what is our positioning, what is our national strategy. For example, we introduced variable components to salaries for players that add incentives and bonuses based on performance on the pitch, training quality or national team consideration. It is one of a lot of things happening in football here, and of course the World Cup has an impact (in stimulating activity and interest).”
Bravo believes that the core of Qatari clubs have to be local players for them to be sustainable and generate a loyal, local fan base.
“When we find good players here we have to keep them, we can’t lose them. The local population is not big enough that it is going to throw us endless local talent. So we have to encourage them and convince them that football is an honourable career.
“Our 17 and 18 year olds can earn money but it is not on the same scale that players of that age in big European clubs can earn. Money would come in when the player achieves success and notoriety, as it should. There is, therefore, a need to make sure players will not give up before reaching that status.
“But it is these local players that will make the big difference to football here. We can build a club around a local star and that will build a strong league, and in time a sustainable business.”
Aspire is not just feeding local players into local clubs, it also has about 15 eighteen year old players in the squads of European clubs and according to Bravo they are “doing fine mixing with the most talented young players there”.
He hopes that some will progress to the bigger European clubs and at the same time raise the profile of the players and league back in Qatar. “It will take time but we know our players are good and can make an impact. But when we find a diamond we will keep polishing it and caring for it. I think this is the real football story in Qatar.”
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