On March 27, 1970, the Qatar national team played its first official match against Bahrain, losing 1-2 with Mubarak Faraj scoring the only goal for Qatar. Soon after, Qatar was one of four founder nations invited to compete in the biannual Gulf Cup event.
In 1977, the national squad played its first FIFA World Cup qualification match. Qatar made its Asian Cup debut in 1980.
Qatar's national team arguably peaked in the 1990s, when it narrowly missed two World Cup qualifying tournaments (1990, 1998) in the final rounds, achieving its highest-ever FIFA ranking (53) in August 1993.
Qatar's first big achievement occurred in 1992 when the "marrons" won the 1992 Gulf Cup. A youthful squad led by the team that had impressed months earlier in the 1992 Summer Olympics dominated the tournament, giving Qatar the opportunity to finally win the long-awaited regional trophy.
The Gulf Cup encouraged the resurrection of a new generation of young Qatari players in the 2000s. In the midst of a moment of uncertainty, Qatar grasped the chance and won the tournament when Doha hosted it in 2004.
2014 was without a doubt one of the most successful years for football in Qatar, with the senior squad winning both the West Asia Football Federation and the Gulf Cup titles in addition to being Asian U-19 champions.
Qatar had an outstanding performance at the 2019 Asian Cup 2019. In their first game, they defeated Lebanon 2-0. This was followed by a 6-0 thumping of North Korea and a 2-0 victory against three-time winners Saudi Arabia, securing the team's first-place finish in the group. They overcame Iraq 1-0 in the Round of 16 and defending runners-up South Korea late in the quarter-finals to go to the semi-finals for the first time ever, where they defeated hosts United Arab Emirates 4-0 to set up a final against four-time champions Japan.
Qatar won the final 3-1 over Japan, claiming their first major tournament championship and finishing off one of the most unlikely Asian Cup campaigns in tournament history, especially given that they surrendered only one goal in all of their games