Firas Al-Khatib


Firas Mohamad Al Khatib is a Syrian retired footballer who predominantly played as a forward. He is Syria's all-time record goalscorer with 36 goals.

Club career

Early life

Al-Khatib began playing football at Al-Karamah SC, he was included in the club's categories U-14, with whom he played for two seasons. One of the most important achievements of Al Khatib with youth Al Karamah was the victory of the Republic Cup and the title of the league's top scorer twice 1994/1995, 1995/1996. He then went on to play for Al Karamah U-17 in 1997, where he was crowned with the league title in the same year.
He also won the top scorer title. All this helped the young boy reach the youth team. During two seasons with U-19 team, he managed to win the league title and the second scorer.

Al Karamah

Al Khatib started his professional career in the Syrian Premier League with Al-Karamah in the Season 1999–00. On 6 October 2000, he scored his first goal in the Syrian Premier League against Al-Futowa which 1–1 finished.
During 2001, he spent two trials in Belgium; first with Gent and the second with Anderlecht.

Al Naser

In August 2002 he transferred to Kuwaiti Club Al-Naser, and played in Kuwaiti Premier League for the first time. He then moved to Al-Arabi, which also competed in the Kuwaiti Premier League.

Al Arabi

With Al-Arabi he won the Kuwait Emir Cup three times, the Kuwait Crown Prince Cup twice and the Kuwait Super Cup once. He also scored 134 goals for the club and became a legend in the club.
On June 2005 he was loaned out to Al-Ahli in Qatar for one match, and played alongside Pep Guardiola.

Qadsia

On 24 August 2009, Al Khatib signed a two-year contract with Al-Qadsia in the Kuwaiti Premier League and played alongside his old teammate Jehad Al-Hussain.
In July 2012, he participated in three games with Nottingham Forest, scoring once in a trial of month. He impressed manager Sean O'Driscoll enough that the club were looking to sign him on a permanent basis but he was denied a work permit and the club was unable to sign him.

Zakho

On 10 September 2012 he tweeted that he signed with Iraqi Premier League club Zakho FC officially.

Shanghai Shenhua

He left Iraq to join Sergio Batista's Chinese Super League side Shanghai Shenhua at February 2013. He scored his first goal in his Chinese Super League debut.

Return to Al Arabi

He became a free agent at the end of the 2013–14 football season and returned to Kuwait. He declined an offer from Kuwait SC and joined Al-Arabi SC on a 2-year deal.
During the first derby against Al-Salmiya SC, Al-Khatib scored his 100th league goal, but Al-Arabi SC lost the match 3–2.
Al-Khatib ended the season with 20 goals and shared the VIVA Premier League 2014-15 top league scorer with Patrick Fabiano. His total goal tally in all competitions was 24 goals. In 2015–16, he was selected in the VIVS Premier League 1st Team alongside teammate Ali Maqseed. Al-Khatib also won the VPL Golden Boot and top scorer of Al-Arabi with 27 goals; his highest tally in any season with any team.

Al Salmiya

In September 2017, he joined to Al-Salmiya, and scored 11 goals in his Kuwaiti Premier League.
He became the best goalscorer in Kuwait Premier League history after he scored 147 goals, exceeding many Kuwaiti legends.

Retirement

On 29 September 2019, Al-Khatib announced his retirement from football after spending the whole summer without a club.

International career

He plays between 2001–2002 for the Syrian U-17 team, he plays for Syria in the AFC U-17 Championship 2002 in the UAE and he was a part of the Syrian U-23 team in the AFC Olympic qualification Athens 2004.
Al Khatib has been a regular for the Syria national football team from 2001 to 2012. His international debut was at the FIFA World Cup qualification 2002., when he came on as a substitute for Khaled Al Zaher in the match against Philippine on 4 May 2001 in the Al-Hamadaniah Stadium in Aleppo. On 11 May 2001 he scored one goal in the FIFA World Cup qualification 2002 match against Laos the match was finished 9–0 for Syria.
From 2012 to 2017, Al-Khatib boycotted the Syrian national football team to protest president Bashar al-Assad and his regime's bombing and starving of Khatib's hometown of Homs in response to massive peaceful protests in 2011. But on 23 March 2017, he re-joined Syrian national football team and showing full support of Al Assad
He wasn't in the final squad of AFC Asian Cup 2019 after getting injured about a month before the tournament, although, he claimed that he was capable of participating if the manager called him because his injury was minor and he could be part of the second match at least. It was really disappointing to him as he mentioned many times on Bein Sports as he was one the pundits there during the tournament. He was one of the first people who asked to sack Stange after the lost against Jordan. In an interview diffused 20th of March 2019, he denied any rows between players about the captaincy before and during Asian cup 2019, and denied also what Omar Al Somah said earlier about falling out for the captaincy armband.
On 5 September 2019, Al Khatib played against Philippine in the 2022 FIFA World Cup qualification; hence he became the first Asian and seventh footballer in total to participate in six different World Cup qualifiers, other footballers are: Gianluigi Buffon, Essam El Hadary, Pat Jennings, Russell Latapy, Víctor René Mendieta Ocampo and Dwight Yorke.

International matches

International goals

NoDateVenueOpponentScoreResultCompetition
1.11 May 2001Al-Hamadaniah Stadium, Aleppo, Syria8–09–02002 FIFA World Cup qualification
2.9 December 2002Bahrain National Stadium, Riffa, Bahrain1–03–2Friendly
3.9 December 2002Bahrain National Stadium, Riffa, Bahrain3–23–2Friendly
4.17 December 2002Kuwait National Stadium, Kuwait City, Kuwait1–03–22002 Arab Nations Cup
5.17 December 2002Kuwait National Stadium, Kuwait City, Kuwait3–23–22002 Arab Nations Cup
6.21 December 2002Kuwait National Stadium, Kuwait City, Kuwait1–04–12002 Arab Nations Cup
7.15 October 2003Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria5–05–02004 AFC Asian Cup qualification
8.18 October 2003Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria1–08–02004 AFC Asian Cup qualification
9.18 October 2003Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria3–08–02004 AFC Asian Cup qualification
10.18 October 2003Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria4–08–02004 AFC Asian Cup qualification
11.7 November 2003Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria1–01–12004 AFC Asian Cup qualification
12.26 March 2004Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria1–01–1Friendly
13.7 February 2006Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria3–03–0Friendly
14.22 February 2006Al-Hamadaniah Stadium, Aleppo, Syria1–11–22007 AFC Asian Cup qualification
15.1 March 2006Zhongshan Soccer Stadium, Taipei, Taiwan4–04–02007 AFC Asian Cup qualification
16.15 November 2006Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria2–03–02007 AFC Asian Cup qualification
17.15 November 2006Abbasiyyin Stadium, Damascus, Syria3–03–02007 AFC Asian Cup qualification
18.8 June 2008Thamir Stadium, Salmiya, Kuwait1–12–42010 FIFA World Cup qualification
19.8 June 2008Thamir Stadium, Salmiya, Kuwait2–22–42010 FIFA World Cup qualification
20.29 December 2008Bahrain National Stadium, Riffa, Bahrain1–02–2Friendly
21.14 January 2009Aleppo International Stadium, Aleppo, Syria3–03–22011 AFC Asian Cup qualification
22.18 January 2009Al-Sadaqua Walsalam Stadium, Kuwait City, Kuwait4–15–1Friendly
23.18 January 2009Al-Sadaqua Walsalam Stadium, Kuwait City, Kuwait5–15–1Friendly
24.23 January 2009Al-Sadaqua Walsalam Stadium, Kuwait City, Kuwait3–23–2Friendly
25.28 January 2009Saida International Stadium, Sidon, Lebanon2–02–02011 AFC Asian Cup qualification
26.27 January 2009Saputo Stadium, Montreal, Canada2–02–1Friendly
27.13 January 2011Qatar SC Stadium, Doha, Qatar1–11–22011 AFC Asian Cup
28.26 August 2017Hang Jebat Stadium, Malacca, Malaysia1–01–1Friendly
29.13 November 2017Karbala Sports City, Karbala, Iraq1–01–1Friendly
30.27 March 2018Basra Sports City, Basra, Iraq1–11–12018 International Friendship Championship
31.23 March 2019Basra Sports City, Basra, Iraq1–01–02019 International Friendship Championship
32.8 July 2019The Arena, Ahmedabad, India5–25–22019 Hero Intercontinental Cup
33.16 July 2019The Arena, Ahmedabad, India1–11–12019 Hero Intercontinental Cup
34.5 August 2019Karbala Sports City, Karbala, Iraq1–11–12019 WAFF Championship
35.11 August 2019Karbala Sports City, Karbala, Iraq2–33–42019 WAFF Championship
36.5 September 2019Panaad Stadium, Bacolod, Philippines3–15–22022 FIFA World Cup qualification

Honours

Club

Al-Arabi
Al-Qadsia
Kuwait SC
;Syria
He is married and has 6 children.