Three forgotten men and the birth of Iraq’s national football team | Hassanin Mubarak

Tale of how sons of a former British army officer and Orthodox priest helped to shape the side is told in this book extract

In 2001, exactly 50 years after the Iraqi national team was formed, I made a discovery. I was reading a comment on the old sports forum about a player named Saeed Easho. It was the start to unearthing the story of Iraq’s first national team.

Many years later I contacted the ex-footballer, and through him it seemed as if everything fell into place. He had spent the best part of 60 years living outside Iraq so no one knew what had happened to the centre-half of Iraq’s first national side.

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from Football | The Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/nov/30/three-forgotten-men-and-the-birth-of-iraqs-national-football-team