The Iraq national team has experienced some exciting times qualifying for the 1986 World Cup, the Moscow, Los Angeles and Seoul Olympics among other notable achievements, but this team is no stranger to bone crushing motivational tactics and leadership. Very few players in the world have ever played 'the beautiful game' with their necks on the line, in case of defeats - yet in the days of Saddam Hussein, a loss was never an option under whatever circumstances for the unfortunate lads who dared to put on the Iraqi jersey. Managed along the lines of a small militia unit by Saddam's first born son Uday, the footballers risked facing tough jail time for missing training sessions; Uday made consistent threats to the players without any shortage of mind numbing examples which included nocturnal baths in raw sewage. He made even the toughest taskmasters look like sunday school teachers often using thorns to whip feet of anyone who dared miss an open goal or worse score an own goal. For the men in green and white, the Olympic Committee headquarters in Baghdad represented a hell house no sportsperson would want to be associated with, yet for the Iraq team it held unavoidable sinister sporting business. Fully equipped with torture goodies like the dreadful sarcophagus with nails pointing inwards from every surface designed for maximum puncture and suffocation, and these were the tools of the trade for Uday as the Iraqi Olympic Committee president. A series of poor passes were carefully counted and at end of the match the culprit would be on the receiving end of an equivalent number of full facial blows. But this was the lighter side of the reprimands as the players also endured 'matches from hell' which entailed kicking concrete balls at the military prison accompanied by some 'free for all' electric cable flogging followed by the gut wrenching 12 hour military drill sessions. A former coach of the Iraqis, Emmanuel Baba Dano often received threats to extract his tongue whenever they clashed over team selection.
