Kitchee, three-time Hong Kong Premier League champions, finished fourth last season and are determined to regain their position at the top.

Sliskovic, who arrived in Hong Kong on Wednesday, was unveiled as the new head coach on Thursday.

The 1-0 defeat – 4.25’s first in six outings – nevertheless saw the Koreans retain their position at the top of the Group I standings, and they will now line-up alongside the winners of the ASEAN, Central and South in the next stage of the competition having performed superbly throughout the group stage.

The result, meanwhile, left Kitchee to reflect on what could have been after a campaign in which they garnered three wins and a draw en route to finishing five points behind their table-topping opponents.

After a slow start to proceedings at the Mong Kok Stadium, 4.25 fashioned the first genuine opportunity of the match when Pak Myong-song fired a free-kick narrowly wide of the target with 12 minutes on the clock.

The ASEAN Zonal Final will see Becamex Binh Duong hosting Hanoi FC in the first leg at the Binh Duong Stadium on July 31. The return leg of the all-Vietnam ASEAN Zonal Final will be played on August 7.

The ASEAN Zonal winners will face 2018 runners-up Altyn Asyr in the Inter-Zone Semi-final on August 20, with the return leg on August 27.

The 69-year-old Serbian, affectionately known as ‘Raddy’, was famously coach of the Singapore national team from 2003 to 2012; a golden period for Singaporean football.

In his nine-year stint at the helm, Avramovic won three AFF Cups (2004, 2007 and 2012) with the Singapore Lions and was named the AFF Coach of the Year in 2013.

Ceres Negros were eliminated in the 2019 AFC Cup ASEAN Zonal semi-finals by Vietnam champions Hanoi FC 3-2 on aggregate.

The centre-back, who joined Ceres Negros at the beginning of the season, started both legs of the Zonal semi-final.

Abdullah Al Attar scored inside the first five minutes before Feras Shelbaieh, Ahmad Al Essawi and Zaid Jaber netted in the second half to complete a 4-0 rout at Amman International Stadium on Tuesday.

The Lebanese side held on to secure a goalless draw at home on Monday and book a place in the West Zonal Final off the back of a 1-0 away victory over Al Wehdat in the first leg a week earlier.

“I would like to apologise to the fans,” said Marmar. “We have not played to the level they have come to expect from us. We achieved the most important thing which is reaching the [Zonal] final, but we could and should have played better.”