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AFC qualifying thread

Muz said:
Rather than combine it into east and west wouldn't it be easier to just have Oceania have their own run off tournament and then the top 2 (or 4 or whatever teams) get thrown in the Asian confed?

Would be much more palatable to the AFC than Saudi having to visit Tonga or whoever.
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In that scenario, Saudi won’t have to travel further east than India, and Tonga, to China/Japan, etc.

The rest of Oceania (rankings wise) are on par with a lot of lower Asia, so it doesn’t make sense in that way, to make OFC a pre-run to the AFC qualifiers - they’d just be included in the lower ranks of the Pacific/East Asia earlier rounds (alongside countries like Timor Leste, Cambodia, Singapore, Chinese Taipei, to name a few)
 
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NicCarBel said:
In that scenario, Saudi won’t have to travel further east than India, and Tonga, to China/Japan, etc.

The rest of Oceania (rankings wise) are on par with a lot of lower Asia, so it doesn’t make sense in that way, to make OFC a pre-run to the AFC qualifiers - they’d just be included in the lower ranks of the Pacific/East Asia earlier rounds (alongside countries like Timor Leste, Cambodia, Singapore, Chinese Taipei, to name a few)
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Fair point but in your scenario of a split Asia would we ever play Tajikistan and any of the Middle Eastern teams then?

It'd be a shame to be just jammed in with the same mobs forever and a day.

Sorry, it may have been covered elsewhere. I've come in late.
 
Muz said:
Fair point but in your scenario of a split Asia would we ever play Tajikistan and any of the Middle Eastern teams then?

It'd be a shame to be just jammed in with the same mobs forever and a day.

Sorry, it may have been covered elsewhere. I've come in late.
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No - although maybe a playoff round at the end between the 2x 5th nations.

The adsorption of OFC, and then split into East-West, would result in two confederations of roughly 30 each
 
NicCarBel said:
No - although maybe a playoff round at the end between the 2x 5th nations.

The adsorption of OFC, and then split into East-West, would result in two confederations of roughly 30 each
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Not sure if I'm a fan of that in that case but it does make sense to absorb Oceania in.
 
Updated projected intercontinental playoffs (using current standings for placement, and rankings for any further rounds)

OFC - New Caledonia
AFC - Saudi Arabia
CONMEBOL - Venezuela
CAF - Senegal
CONCACAF 1 - Honduras
CONCACAF 2 - Haiti
 
Muz said:
Rather than combine it into east and west wouldn't it be easier to just have Oceania have their own run off tournament and then the top 2 (or 4 or whatever teams) get thrown in the Asian confed?

Would be much more palatable to the AFC than Saudi having to visit Tonga or whoever.
Click to expand...
Yep, play the Oceania preliminaries at the same time as the Asia first and second rounds (Australia started off in the second round this edition against Palestine, Lebanon and Bangladesh), then take the top 1 or 2 Oceania teams into the Asian third round.
 
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Keeper66 said:
Yep, play the Oceania preliminaries at the same time as the Asia first and second rounds (Australia started off in the second round this edition against Palestine, Lebanon and Bangladesh), then take the top 1 or 2 Oceania teams into the Asian third round.
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I think to do so would mean they’d have to make Asia’s Round 1 regionalised. And I don’t think FIFA will regionalise World Cup Qualifiers further than considerations
 
NicCarBel said:
I think to do so would mean they’d have to make Asia’s Round 1 regionalised. And I don’t think FIFA will regionalise World Cup Qualifiers further than considerations
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Why would Asia round 1 need to be regionalised? Round 1 was the lowest ranked teams playing off over two legs to determine who goes into round 2 (the 4 team round robin groups) with the higher ranked nations. Am I missing something in what you are saying?
 
Keeper66 said:
Why would Asia round 1 need to be regionalised? Round 1 was the lowest ranked teams playing off over two legs to determine who goes into round 2 (the 4 team round robin groups) with the higher ranked nations. Am I missing something in what you are saying?
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Yes, because by letting only a certain amount of Oceania’s countries into later rounds, Oceania effectively becomes, for qualifiers, a region of Asia.

I don’t think that would ever happen under FIFA - as they don’t regionalise qualifiers for Asia like AFC does for Champions league, etc - because once you regionalise part of the qualifiers, you need to do it for the whole confederation at the same point.

In saying that, if going down that path, the easiest way to do it is maybe have the bottom 10 ranked of Oceania, and the bottom 12 of each East, West have a playoff against each other, which would remove the necessary teams to still have an open 10x groups of 4 second round.

Another reason why they won’t regionalise (without officially setting up new confederations), is because AFC piggy backs of these for the Asian Cup qualifiers (with nations that were knocked out in the first group stage) competing in standalone Asian Cup qualifiers - which are also unregionalised.
Keeper66 said:
Why would Asia round 1 need to be regionalised? Round 1 was the lowest ranked teams playing off over two legs to determine who goes into round 2 (the 4 team round robin groups) with the higher ranked nations. Am I missing something in what you are saying?
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Yes, because by letting only a certain amount of Oceania’s countries into later rounds, Oceania effectively becomes, for qualifiers, a region of Asia.

I don’t think that would ever happen under FIFA - as they don’t regionalise qualifiers for Asia like AFC does for Champions league, etc - because once you regionalise part of the qualifiers, you need to do it for the whole confederation at the same point.

In saying that, if going down that path, the easiest way to do it is maybe have the bottom 10 ranked of Oceania, and the bottom 12 of each East, West have a playoff against each other, which would remove the necessary teams to still have an open 10x groups of 4 second round.

Another reason why they won’t regionalise (without officially setting up new confederations), is because AFC piggy backs of these for the Asian Cup qualifiers (with nations that were knocked out in the first group stage) competing in standalone Asian Cup qualifiers - which are also unregionalised.
 
NicCarBel said:
Yes, because by letting only a certain amount of Oceania’s countries into later rounds, Oceania effectively becomes, for qualifiers, a region of Asia.

I don’t think that would ever happen under FIFA - as they don’t regionalise qualifiers for Asia like AFC does for Champions league, etc - because once you regionalise part of the qualifiers, you need to do it for the whole confederation at the same point.

In saying that, if going down that path, the easiest way to do it is maybe have the bottom 10 ranked of Oceania, and the bottom 12 of each East, West have a playoff against each other, which would remove the necessary teams to still have an open 10x groups of 4 second round.

Another reason why they won’t regionalise (without officially setting up new confederations), is because AFC piggy backs of these for the Asian Cup qualifiers (with nations that were knocked out in the first group stage) competing in standalone Asian Cup qualifiers - which are also unregionalised.

Yes, because by letting only a certain amount of Oceania’s countries into later rounds, Oceania effectively becomes, for qualifiers, a region of Asia.

I don’t think that would ever happen under FIFA - as they don’t regionalise qualifiers for Asia like AFC does for Champions league, etc - because once you regionalise part of the qualifiers, you need to do it for the whole confederation at the same point.

In saying that, if going down that path, the easiest way to do it is maybe have the bottom 10 ranked of Oceania, and the bottom 12 of each East, West have a playoff against each other, which would remove the necessary teams to still have an open 10x groups of 4 second round.

Another reason why they won’t regionalise (without officially setting up new confederations), is because AFC piggy backs of these for the Asian Cup qualifiers (with nations that were knocked out in the first group stage) competing in standalone Asian Cup qualifiers - which are also unregionalised.
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I understand what you are saying, but I still don't see it as regionalising. And even if you do see it as regionalising, it doesn't mean it needs to be done for the whole confederation.

If AFC rounds 1 and 2 only contain Asian teams, then the non-qualifiers from these rounds can still go on to qualifiers for the Asian Cup (as happens now) without any OFC nations impacting on it. And then at the same time as AFC rounds 1 and 2 are played, OFC have their qualifiers to produce 1 or 2 qualifiers to join AFC for AFC rounds 3 and 4.

In some respects, it is not much different to the play-offs between confederations, it's just that OFC compete against AFC in an earlier part of the qualification.
 
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Keeper66 said:
I understand what you are saying, but I still don't see it as regionalising. And even if you do see it as regionalising, it doesn't mean it needs to be done for the whole confederation.

If AFC rounds 1 and 2 only contain Asian teams, then the non-qualifiers from these rounds can still go on to qualifiers for the Asian Cup (as happens now) without any OFC nations impacting on it. And then at the same time as AFC rounds 1 and 2 are played, OFC have their qualifiers to produce 1 or 2 qualifiers to join AFC for AFC rounds 3 and 4.

In some respects, it is not much different to the play-offs between confederations, it's just that OFC compete against AFC in an earlier part of the qualification.
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Because inherently, countries shouldn’t be negatively affected by the region they are in within the same qualifying path. The reason why it worked before in intercontinental playoffs like you mentioned, is because it’s the final playoff.

The main reason Oceania as a whole looks weaker, is because NZ is the only ‘strong’ nation in it - so all results look bad against that.

Bahrain v Nepal is a similar jump in rankings as say, NZ v Vanuatu - and both turn out pretty similar.

The “fairest” way I can see it combining (without the “absorption + split” that I’ve created on paper) is to just include Oceania in AFC qualifiers, but they are kept to the same standards. Could essentially go the Africa route and have 9 groups of 6 (with the bottom 6 ranked nations playing off to finalise the 54 nations), or groups of 5 (which would have the bottom 24 nations playing off).

As an example, below are the countries that would have to playoff under each format (in order of lowest ranked to highest, first 6 would be in playoffs for both)
  • Guam (AFC East)
  • Sri Lanka (AFC West)
  • Tonga (OFC)
  • Pakistan (AFC West)
  • Timor-Leste (AFC East)
  • Macau (AFC East)
  • Samoa (OFC)
  • Cook Islands (OFC)
  • Mongolia (AFC East)
  • American Samoa (OFC)
  • Laos (AFC East)
  • Bangladesh (AFC West)
  • Brunei (AFC East)
  • Bhutan (AFC West)
  • Cambodia (AFC East)
  • Nepal (AFC West)
  • Papua New Guinea (OFC)
  • Myanmar (AFC East)
  • Chinese Taipei (AFC East)
  • Vanuatu (OFC)
  • Maldives (AFC West)
  • Singapore (AFC East)
  • Yemen (AFC West)
  • Afghanistan (AFC West)
This would mean New Zealand, Solomon Islands, Fiji, New Caledonia and Tahiti would all take part in the AFC Group Stage (second round).
 
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