Ali Ashfaq - International Career

International Career

Ashfaq became captain of the senior Maldives national football team in 2009, when he was 23. He has won numerous Maldivian football awards and is known for his dribbling ability, agility, speed, accuracy and powerful shooting. He is the youngest ever player to score for the senior Maldives National Football Team (four goals against Mongolia in 2004) and the first to score two hat-tricks for the national side, the second of which was in the 2011 AFC Challenge Cup Qualifier against Cambodia.

Ashfaq lost a place in the Maldivian squad for the 2003 SAFF Championship in Dhaka, Bangladesh, to his fellow national team striker Ahmed Thoriq. Ashfaq's first SAFF Championship was the 2005 South Asian Football Federation Gold Cup in Karachi. In the group stage he scored two goals against Afghanistan and one against Sri Lanka. Maldives were knocked out by India in the semi final.

Maldives and Sri Lanka co-hosted the next SAFF Championship in 2008, when Maldives won their first SAFF Championship title. Despite his goalless run throughout the tournament, Ashfaq assisted six goals for the side and was named Most Valuable Player of the tournament. As a result, he was included in the list of www.goal.com's Asia's top ten performers of 2008.

In the 2009 SAFF Championship, Ashfaq was the team captain and scored three goals. Maldives lost the final to India on penalties. Ashfaq was runner-up for the Most Valuable Player of the tournament and was voted the best player of the tournament by the Bangladeshi media.

The SAFF Championship 2011 was hosted by India, and all the matches took place in Delhi. The Maldivian side went to the tournament with high hopes after replacing their Argentine coach Diego Cruciani with their 2009 coach Istavan Urbanyi. Maldives joined Pakistan, Nepal and Bangladesh, the 2003 champions, in what was called the Group of Death. Maldives' first match was against Nepal. In the dying minutes in the first half, Ashfaq scored with an outstanding long range shot, which was praised by the international media as the best goal of the tournament. The match ended in a draw as Nepal equalized in the second half. The Maldives–Pakistan match was also a draw, and this time the media criticized Ashfaq for an average performance. In the following, decisive match, he scored and assisted a goal after dribbling past three defenders. The Indian commentator referred to him as the South Asian George Best and invited the audience to watch "the eyes of a tiger" as he scored. Maldives were knocked out in the semifinal by the eventual winners, India. Ashfaq was included in the "Eastern promise: Ten to watch in 2012" shortlist by John Duerden of www.espnstar.com.