2023-06-15 03:21:43
32,000 inhabitants spread over some 6.8 km² in the far south of the Iberian Peninsula. It is against a very small territory, and in fact, against a very small nation of the football planet that France is preparing to play its third qualifying match for Euro 2024, this Friday evening in Faro in Portugal. .
Didier Deschamps himself acknowledged this during the press conference at the start of the Blues rally, “on paper, he is not the most formidable opponent we will have to play”. 201st in the Fifa rankings out of 211 nations, Gibraltar is the little Thumb of this group B, and remains on two defeats since the start of qualifying. History, team, players, relocation… We decipher this little-known team.
A national team founded in the 1920s
In this British territory, still claimed by Spain, football is one of the most popular and practiced sports. We have to go back to 1923 and a friendly match against Sevilla to observe the first concrete results of the national team of Gibraltar, when its first participation in an official competition dates back to 1993, on the occasion of the “Island Games”, the Games of the Islands . But it was not until 2013 that UEFA finally admitted Gibraltar as a member, allowing it to participate in European competitions. The team was admitted to Fifa in 2016, which gave them the opportunity to take part in the qualifiers for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, a first.
So far, the men of Julio Cesar Ribas, who arrived at the head of the team in 2018, have not achieved any real successes. By snatching a draw against Bulgaria (1-1) on June 9, 2022 during the League of Nations, they still won their first point in official competition. In friendly, the same year, they offered Andorra (1-0) and Liechtenstein (2-0). But the Blues remain suspicious. “The team reminds me of Ireland, which we faced in March. We had a lot of trouble beating them, admitted Ibrahima Konaté this Wednesday at a press conference. It’s going to be hot, it’s going to be a difficult match.
Players from the national, semi-professional championship
The squad led by Julio Cesar Ribas is made up above all of players from the first division championship of Gibraltar, a semi-professional championship. In an interview with So Foot en 2021central defender Roy Chipolina, whom the Blues will find this Friday, explained: “apart from five or six players who are full-time, the others have a job”.
In the history of this championship shines a club in particular: the Lincoln Red Imps. Since its foundation in 1976, the club has won 27 titles. In its current workforce, there are locals, but also Spanish players. At the end of each season, the winner of the championship secures a place in the preliminary round of the Champions League. His dolphin, he inherits a ticket for the preliminary round of the Europa League.
“Home” matches played in… Portugal
Since 2018, Gibraltar has played on its own territory for home matches, in the modest “Victoria Stadium”, thanks to an authorization from UEFA, despite the non-compliance with certain obligations, particularly regarding lighting, the capacity of the stadium (5,000 seats) and other more technical infrastructure points.
In his press release issued in October 2022, the Gibraltar Football Federation indicated that this exemption had been granted on the condition that work on the new stadium be launched in 2020-2021. “Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, this work has been delayed, and UEFA has therefore extended its exemption until the end of the 2022 Nations League campaign,” she added. Last match to date at Victoria Stadium: Gibraltar-Georgia, on September 26th. The Georgians won 2-1.
Since then, it is therefore at the “Estadio do Algarve”, the Algarve Stadium in Faro, Portugal, an enclosure with 30,000 seats, that the Gibraltarians have received their opponents. This was recently the case against Greece on March 23, still in the context of these Euro 2024 qualifiers. Gibraltar then lost three goals to zero.
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