Hi I'm Richard Conway and thanks for downloading this World Service podcast.

I'm a sports correspondent with the BBC and I don't normally get to go and visit places like Syria

to go to conflict zones to go to places where there's war but But together with my colleague David Lockwood, we were

sat in our office at the BBC late last year and we noticed that Syria were doing very well in terms

of their World Cup qualifying campaign and we wanted to know more about why that was the case.

It took us on a journey that encompassed going to Damascus, that took us to Jordan,

to a refugee camp and finally to Malaysia.

And as you'll hear now in the program,

what we discovered along the way is the very complicated story

about football, about football within Syria

and about why sport matters there to so many people.

The pitch may be in a

the pitch may be in a shocking state, it's threadbare with as much dried earth as grass,

and the play stops frequently for injuries, but the few fans here are in good voice. I'm a guy this time.

I'm Richard

I'm Richard

I'm Richard Conway and this is a low-key fixture in Syria's Premier League.

More than six years of a brutal civil war, along with international sanctions, have affected all parts of life here in

Syria including football and yet despite the very real difficulties the Syrian

national side has performed beyond expectations and is still in with a chance of

qualifying for next year's World Cup in Russia. For assignment on the BBC World

Service I've been following the team which cannot play its matches back home in Syria but which is defying the odds

...