ASIAN FOOTBALL CONFEDERATION

The 46 member 'Asian Football Confederation' ('AFC') is the governing body of football in Asia, excluding Cyprus and Israel but including Australia. It was founded in 1954 in Manila, Philippines, and is one of FIFA's six Continental Confederations. (Nations with some European and some Asian territory, such as Russia, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Georgia, are instead covered by UEFA.) The main headquarters is located in Bukit Jalil, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The current president is Mohammed Bin Hammam of Qatar.

Contents

AFC competitions

Women's football in Asia

Regions

ASEAN Football Federation

East Asian Football Federation

West Asian Football Federation

Central and South Asian Football Federation

Competitions

AFC tournaments

Regional tournaments

World Cup qualifiers

Totals (current members)

AFC Awards

Asian Footballer of the Year

Asian Young Footballer of the Year

Asian Cup Most Valuable Player

Asian Women's Player of the Year

External links

AFC competitions

The AFC runs the Asian Cup, a competition for the national football teams of Asia held every four years, as well as the Asian World Cup Qualifying Tournament and the AFC Challenge Cup.
It also runs the Asian Olympics Qualifying Tournament.
The AFC also runs three levels of annual international club competitions. The most prestigious (and oldest of the current AFC club competitions) is the AFC Champions League tournament, based on the UEFA Champions League, formed in 2002/03 with the amalgamation of the ''Asian Champions Cup'' and the ''Asian Cup Winners Cup''. (An Asian Super Cup competition between the winners of these two major tournaments ended with the birth of the AFC Champions League.) The other competitions branched off this in 2004 when the 'Vision Asia' blueprint for development was launched. This led to the top fourteen AFC nations, the 'mature nations', sending their best teams to the AFC Champions League. The next 14 nations, the 'developing nations' qualify to send their teams to the AFC Cup.
The rest of the AFC-affiliated countries, the 'emerging nations' send their teams to the AFC President's Cup. The teams which qualify from each country are usually the champions and the cup winners ^[1]. Currently there is no promotion and relegation between the different levels of nations.
The AFC is going to revamp 22 leagues in Asia, 10 of them by 2009-2012. This is due to the poor performance / absence of Asian teams in the 2006 World Cup. The reforms include: increasing transparency, increase competitiveness, improving training facilities and forcing the leagues to have a system of relegation and promotion. [2]
The 10 leagues marked for reform are: Australia, Japan, China, South Korea, Singapore, India, Iran, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Qatar. The proposal would mark a radical change in Australia, where professional leagues in all sports are organised on a model of franchised teams and closed league membership, a system most commonly identified with North America.
There are 12 AFC Nations that play in the UAFA organised Arab Nations Cup. These are Bahrain, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Qatar, Oman, Palestine, Saudi Arabia, Syria, United Arab Emirates and Yemen.

Women's football in Asia

The Asian Ladies Football Confederation (ALFC) is the section of the AFC who manage women's football in Asia. The group was independently founded in April 1968 in a meeting involving Taiwan, Hong Kong, Malaysia and Singapore. In 1986 the ALFC merged with the AFC ^[3]. The Asian Ladies Football Confederation helped organise the AFC Women's Championship, first held in 1975, as well as the AFC's AFC U-19 Women's Championship and the AFC U-17 Women's Championship.
On January 1 2006 Australia became the 46th member of the AFC. See the list of AFC member states.

Regions

The AFC is split into 4 regions[4]. Below shows how the national teams of Asia are split up by region (but are not necessarily part of their regional football federation). As a rule, because of cultural restrictions, only the ASEAN and East Asian regions field equivalent women's teams.

ASEAN Football Federation

Main articles: ASEAN Football Federation


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East Asian Football Federation

Main articles: East Asian Football Federation


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West Asian Football Federation

Main articles: West Asian Football Federation


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Central and South Asian Football Federation

Main articles: Central and South Asian Football Federation


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★ South Asian countries)''

Competitions

AFC tournaments

Regional tournaments

★ 'ASEAN': ASEAN Football Championship (formely known as the Tiger Cup prior to 2007)-

★ 'Central Asia': Officially only 4 countries in this region (Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. Kazakhstan left for UEFA). No official tournament held between countries in this region.

★ 'East Asia': East Asian Cup

★ 'South Asia': South Asian Football Federation Cup

★ 'West Asia': West Asian Football Federation Championship (Although not all West Asian Countries enter), Gulf Cup of Nations

World Cup qualifiers

★ 1930 - None

★ 1934 - None

★ 1938 - Dutch East Indies (now Indonesia)

★ 1950 - India (however it withdrew from the World Cup after qualifying due to lack of funding for equipment and travel)

★ 1954 - Korea Republic

★ 1958 - None

★ 1962 - None

★ 1966 - Korea DPR

★ 1970 - ''Israel'' (now a member of UEFA)

★ 1974 - None

★ 1978 - Iran

★ 1982 - Kuwait

★ 1986 - Iraq, Korea Republic

★ 1990 - Korea Republic, United Arab Emirates

★ 1994 - Korea Republic, Saudi Arabia

★ 1998 - Iran, Japan, Korea Republic, Saudi Arabia

★ 2002 - China PR, Japan, Korea Republic, Saudi Arabia

★ 2006 - Iran, Japan, Korea Republic, Saudi Arabia,

Totals (current members)

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'' (both as an OFC member.)''

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''(withdrew after qualifying)''
''(as Dutch East Indies)''

AFC Awards

Asian Footballer of the Year

''See Asian Footballer of the Year''

Asian Young Footballer of the Year

''See Asian Young Footballer of the Year''

Asian Cup Most Valuable Player

''See Asian Cup Most Valuable Player''

Asian Women's Player of the Year

''See AFC Women's Player of the Year''

External links

★ Official Website

★ Asian Champions League Website

★ Asian Cup website

★ AFC Women's Asian Cup and AFC U-19 Women's Championship

★ Asian women's football history

★ FootballAsia.com - article on ranking systems for AFC club competitions

★ Unofficial Asian Football Forum