▼

Friday, January 21, 2011

2015 AFC Asian Cup: Bad news for Saudi Arabia

AFC will most likely use the 2011 AFC Asian Cup performance to seed the teams for both the preliminary competition and the final tournament of the 2015 edition.

Outside the top 8 (quarter finalists), the standings are already known.
 9 China PR
10 Bahrain
11 Syria
12 Korea DPR
13 United Arab Emirates
14 Kuwait
15 Saudi Arabia
16 India
17 Oman
18 Yemen
19 Thailand
20 Singapore
21 Vietnam
22 Indonesia
23 Lebanon
24 Hong Kong
25 Malaysia
26 Maldives

Most likely the top 3 in the 2011 AFC Asian Cup will be automatically qualified for the 2015 edition.

if Australia finish in the top 3 and the 4th placed team gets a bye from AFC to the final tournament, or Australia don't finish in the top 3, the qualifying setup will be the same as for Qatar 2011. Assuming the same teams and Korea DPR participate in the preliminaries, here's how things will look like:

First round

Pot 1: Lebanon, Hong Kong
Pot 2: Malaysia, Maldives

Group stage

Pot 1: China PR + worst of the top 8.
Pot 2: Bahrain, Syria, Korea DPR, United Arab Emirates, Kuwait
Pot 3: Saudi Arabia, India, Oman, Yemen, Thailand
Pot 4: Singapore, Vietnam, Indonesia + playoff winners

Saudi Arabia in the third pot. If Korea DPR don't enter the preliminary competition (as they did this time), Saudi Arabia will climb to the second pot.

About me:

Christian, husband, father x 3, programmer, Romanian. Started the blog in March 2007. Quit in April 2018. You can find me on LinkedIn.

on

1 comment:

  1. LorricJanuary 21, 2011 at 5:27 PM

    Ah, the Asian Cup 2015 draw. There is potential for a group containg the loser of Iran/Korea Rep, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia and next door something like Qatar/Kuwait/Yemen.

    It was a minor miracle that for the 2011 qualifiers the groups all came out in a balanced fashion. There was tremendous potential for lopsided groups with all those weak host nations having been involved in the 2007 tournament. It was possible to have something as imbalanced as Vietnam/Indonesia/Hong Kong! Imagine two of those gracing this tournament!

    ReplyDelete