Qaboos bin Said al Said
The first football club of the Sultanate (documented as such) was the Maqboul Club, founded in 1942, known today as the Oman Club. In the 1970s, Qaboos bin Said al Said favored the development of sports events and associations, which led in 1978 to the creation of the Omani Football Association with Sayyid / Haitham bin Tariq Al Said (Minister of National Heritage and Culture and in 2020, the successor to Qaboos as Sultan) as its first president. In its first year of operations, the Association became a member of the Union of Arab Football Associations and of the FIFA, and then joined the Asian Football Federation in 1980.