AFC U23 Championship Qatar 2016: All You Need to Know

BACKGROUND

The inaugural event – the 2013 AFC U22 Championship – took place in Oman in January 2014 after the original tournament was postponed.

This is the first time the event will be used as the qualifier for the Olympic Games. The top three teams from this tournament will qualify for Rio 2016.

The tournament is open to all the AFC’s Member Associations. Participating teams take part in an official qualification round, with 16 advancing to the finals. The qualifiers were held on official match days in March 2015. As with other age-limit national team competitions, the qualification groups were drawn on a zonal basis for the West (West, Central and South Asia) and the East (East and ASEAN). The previous competition’s ranking was applied for the seeding of teams during the draw and Qatar, as 2016 hosts, received a direct bye to the finals.

A total of 44 member associations entered the qualifying competition for the 2016 edition. Excluding Qatar, 43 teams competed in 10 groups, with the group winners and the five best second-placed teams going through to the finals where they will be joined by the hosts.

Widely regarded as the AFC’s second biggest national team competition after the AFC Asian Cup, the competition in Qatar is expected to attract a plethora of attention from sponsors, fans and media alike.

FORMAT

The 16 teams (Qatar, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Korea Republic, Australia, Syria, Japan, UAE, Iran, DPR Korea, Uzbekistan, China, Yemen, Thailand and Vietnam) have been divided into four groups of four teams each and each group shall play a one-round league. The top two teams in each group (eight teams in total) will qualify for the knockout stage. The champions, the runners-up and the third-placed team will qualify for the Olympic Football Tournament Rio 2016.

QUICK LINKS

Groups and Fixtures
Venues
Host City
FEATURE: Asia at the Olympics

THE TEAMS

Official Squad Lists (as of January 10)
Qualifying Results and Group Tables

AUSTRALIA

Australia head to Qatar aiming for a continental double as the Olyroos look to add the U23 trophy to the AFC Asian Cup the senior side won on home soil back in January, while a top-three finish will see Aurelio Vidmar’s side become Australia’s sixth representatives at the Olympic Games since the tournament became an Under 23s competition in 1992. Australia stormed into the 2016 AFC U23 Championship finals after finishing top of Group F, scoring a tournament-leading 15 times in their victories over Hong Kong (6-0), Chinese Taipei (4-0) and Myanmar (5-1), with five of their tally coming from former Scotland U-19 international Jamie Maclaren.

IRAQ

Inaugural champions Iraq, winners of the 2013 AFC U-22 Championship, earned the right to defend their title at next year’s finals in Doha by topping Group A under Yahya Alwan, who subsequently took charge of the senior team in August following an 11th hour change of mind by former Qatar coach Dzemal Hadziabdic. The title holders, who defeated Saudi Arabia 1-0 in the historic final thanks to a 33rd minute winner from 2012 AFC Youth Player of the Year Mohannad Abdul-Raheem, displayed their championship credentials during the qualifiers as they recorded victories over Lebanon (4-1), the Maldives (7-0) and Bahrain (2-0). Iraq picked up the point they needed to top the table in their final match against Oman but not before enduring a nervous finish as the Group A hosts scored twice in the last two minutes as Alwan’s side let slip a two-goal lead.

QATAR

As tournament hosts, Qatar were exempt from the qualifying campaign and will be keen to put on a strong showing on home soil after failing to qualify for the 2013 AFC U-22 Championship. Quarter-finalists at the 1992 Olympics - when the tournament became an under 23 event - and Asian Games gold medal winners on home soil in 2006, Qatar have a reasonable pedigree at this level and could feature a number of players from the side that won the 2014 AFC U-19 Championship in Myanmar.

KOREA REPUBLIC