Qatar will host a friendly game between popular European clubs Paris St. Germain (PSG) and Inter on Dec. 30, the Qatar Football Association (QFA) has announced.
The match will take place at 7:30pm at the Jassim Bin Hamad Stadium in Al Sadd.
Tickets for the game are expected to go on sale in early December, a spokesperson told Doha News.
Both teams will participate in training camps ahead of the match – PSG for four days, and Inter for seven, according to Doha Stadium Plus.
Qatar-owned PSG has held several friendlies here in the past, including a sold-out match with Real Madrid in 2013.
In 2012, the French team reportedly signed an $800-million dollar deal with the Qatar Tourism Authority to promote the image of the country for four seasons.
This will be Italian club Inter’s first time playing in Qatar. The club has won multiple domestic trophies, as well as the Champions League three times.
In a statement about the upcoming match, QFA CEO Mansour Al Ansari said:
“Both Paris Saint-Germain and Inter Milan are flying high in their respective domestic leagues, so it promises to be an exciting match and occasion. The squads of both teams contain some of the most gifted players in the world and we are sure that every football fan in Qatar will be eager to attend this prestigious game.”
He added that the friendly would be a “test event” for Qatar, which will host the 2016 AFC U23 Championship in January and has been preparing for the 2022 World Cup.
FC Barcelona
Meanwhile, despite repeated pledges, Spanish club FC Barcelona has yet to play a friendly match in Qatar.
The team has a five-year deal with Qatar Sports Investment that entailed wearing Qatar Foundation’s logo and then Qatar Airways’ logo on its jerseys.
The current multi-million dollar agreement is set to expire at the end of the 2015-2016 season.
The team has been in negotiations with Qatar Airways about renewing the sponsorship deal, but is apparently having trouble agreeing on a price.
Speaking to the National this week at the Dubai Airshow, CEO Akbar Al Baker said:
“We are in the middle of negotiations with them. If the conditions and the price is correct we will consider. We cannot consider if the commercial proposal they put is unacceptable to us.”
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