Asian Cup of Nations 2023 simulations (December 2023)

In 2024 five of the six confederations have scheduled their continental championship for national teams. Here's number two in this series of simulation reports: Asia.

The Asian Cup of Nations 2023 was initially scheduled for June 2023 in Qatar. Just as with the World Cup last year the tournament couldn't be played in the Qatari Summer because it's much too hot there in that time of the year. So the continental showpiece had to be moved back to January 2024. That gave Qatar the opportunity to participate 'as guest' (or rather as the generous tournament sponsor who bought their berth) in the Gold Cup 2023 in the USA last July.

AFC Nations Cup 2023 qualification simulations (May 2022)

The qualification for the AFC Nations Cup 2023 is divided in two parts:

• the Asian first and second stage in the qualification for the World Cup 2022 delivered 12 teams: the 8 group winners and the 4 best group runners-up (excluding host China) of the second group stage qualify. China was one of the four best runners-up;
• the rest of the teams entered the separate qualification path for the remaining 11 berths in the 24-team AFC Nations Cup 2023: two play-offs in October 2021 to wittle the remaining teams down to 24 and a group stage with 6 groups of 4 teams. The 6 group winners and the 5 best group runners-up qualify.

China is as host, although they of course participated in the World Cup qualification, automatically qualified for the continental final. From the WC qualification part the 8 group winners qualified (Syria, Australia, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Japan, United Arab Emirates and Korea Republic) together with the 4 best runners-up (Oman, Iraq, Vietnam and Lebanon).

AFC qualification World Cup 2022 simulations (January 2021)

Only a single match was played in the Asian qualification for the World Cup last year. The last four match days of the second round are rescheduled now for the coming March and June windows. After the Summer round three, consisting of 2 groups of 6 teams, will commence. The 12 qualified teams will be put in 6 pots of two. Which FIFA ranking (June or July) is used for seeding is yet unknown, because the publication schedule for 2021 is not yet published.

The AFC managed to keep the same qualification format. The matches for round three are now scheduled from September until March 2022. And the next step -where the Asian number 5 is determined between the two group numbers 3- is scheduled in June 2022 as a single match now. In that same June window the interconfederational play-offs (with the Asian number 5) are staged.