Saudi Arabia declares public holiday after historic FIFA World Cup win

Saudi Arabia's King Salman, father of the Crown Prince Mohammad Bin Salman declared a national holiday on Wednesday, Nov 23 to mark the victory at the 2022 World Cup hosted in Qatar. Green Falcons’ 2-1 win over Argentina shocked the Saudi Arabians as they defeated one of the world’s top-ranked football teams, making the history in the Tuesday's tournament. “This is football. Sometimes things are completely crazy,” Saudi Arabia coach Hervé Renard reportedly said. “All the stars aligned for us,” he added. All public and private sectors, as well as all students will observe the national holiday to rejoice the Green Falcons' win. Saudi Arabia beat Argentina 2-1 at the Lusail Stadium in Doha. 

Prince Saud, one of the brothers of Mohammad Bin Salman (MBS) shared the pictures on Instagram showing the crown prince prostrating in thanks to God in a room. His brother Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz was also present in the same room and was seen holding a Saudi flag. As saudi Arabia made its historic win, Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad was seen draping the Saudi flag over his shoulders at the match.

A Doha skyscraper flashed "Congratulations Greens" as Saudi Arabians cheered waving the Saudi flag and wrapping it around them. Saudi Arabia's declaration isn't the first public holiday of a kind as Cameroon's stellar performance against Argentina during the 1990 World Cup in Italy also ended in a public holiday for the fans. 

Saudi Arabia in the footbll match against Argentina sparked one of the biggest World Cup upsets ever in history of the sport by beating Lionel Messi’s Argentina 2-1. Goalkeeper Mohammed Alowais made two key saves late in the game to preserve the win at Lusail Stadium north of Doha.

“I am very happy about this result that we have been able to obtain against this very storied team,” Alowais said, according to Associated Press. “We have prepared ourselves. We were 100% ready and hopefully we will have better results in the future. I felt we were especially good in the last minutes because we secured our three points," he added. 

Saudi Arabia's record at FIFA World Cup: At a glance

In 1994, under the leadership of Argentine manager Jorge Solari and with the support of national veteran Majed Abdullah as team captain, Saudi Arabia made it to their first FIFA World Cup. After victories in the group stage over Belgium and Morocco, the team faced Sweden in the round of 16, where they were defeated 3-1. Saudi Arabia made it into the following three World Cups, but they failed to win a game in any of them; in 2002, they finished bottom without scoring and let up 12 goals, including eight against Germany.

Again the team qualified in 2006 but was unable to prove their mettle as the team didn't win a single game in this campaign. After a long hiatus of 12 years, Saudi Arabia again qualified in 2018 which was held in Russia. here too, the start was not pretty good as the team faced defeat by the host in the very first as Russia fired 5 goals against them. Later in the same campaign, the team went on to lose against Uraguay but managed a narrow win against Egypt. 

In the 2022 Qatar World Cup, the Middle East team started their campaign with a blast defeating Copa America champions Argentia. Many from the footballing fraternity have already framed it as the 'biggest upset' of this year's World Cup. The Middle East has to face Poland and later Nigeria in their world cup campaign.