FIFA World Cup 2018 is still a long way off from now but the for the Asian teams from aspiring to be a part of 2018 World Cup in Russia will begin their journey towards the second round of qualification.
The draw for the second round of qualification for the Asian teams have been revealed. The format has been kept relatively simple with 40 teams from the Asian Football Confederation were split into eight groups of five. The group winners and four best second-placed teams are set to progress to the final qualifying round.
Seeding for the teams were done on the basis of FIFA rankings released on April 9 and based on that, all the seeded teams were placed in pot 1 for today’s draw.
Second round of qualification will start on June 11 this year till March 29, 2016. The same top eight teams and the four best second-placed teams will also qualify for the Asian Cup in 2019.
The five pots for Today’s draw were:
Pot 1 (Teams ranked 1st to 8th): Iran, Japan, Korea Republic, Australia, UAE, Uzbekistan, China, Iraq
Pot 2 (Teams ranked 9th to 16th): Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain, Vietnam, Syria and Kuwait
Pot 3 (Teams ranked 17th to 24th): Afghanistan, Philippines, Palestine, Maldives, Thailand, Tajikistan, Lebanon and India
Pot 4 (Teams ranked 25th to 32nd): Timor-Leste, Kyrgyzstan, DPR Korea, Myanmar, Turkmenistan, Indonesia, Singapore and Bhutan
Pot 5 (Teams ranked 33rd to 40th): Malaysia, Hong Kong, Bangladesh, Yemen, Guam, Laos, Cambodia and Chinese Taipei
India recored an imprssive win over Nepal in a two-legged affair to reach the second Qualifyings stage. Thanks to that win, India has climbed 27 places in the FIFA rankings to find themselves at 147th place in the world and 24th among asian teams.
Let’s take a look at the Qualifying draw for the 2018 World Cup for the Asian teams:
Group A – UAE, Saudi Arabia, Palistine, Timor-Leste, Malaysia
Group B – Australia, Jordan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Bangaldesh
Group C – China, Qatar, Maldives, Bhutan, Hong kong
Group D – Iran, Oman, India, Turmenistan, Guam
Group E – Japan, Syria, Afghanistan, Singapore, Cambodia
Group F – Iraq, Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia, Chinese Taipai
Group G – Korea Republic, Kuwait, Lebanon, Myanmar, Laos
Group H – Uzbekistan, Bahrain, Phillipines, DPR Korea, Yemen
The matches will start in June this year and will use all the FIFA competition dates till March 2016.
Asia’s third and final round of qualification matches will start late next year leaving only 4-5 teams from Asia to be a part of 2018 World Cup in Russia.
Japan, Australia, South Korea and Iran qualified for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil but were eliminated in the first round itself without winning even 1 match.