2026 AFC Qualifiers

[blahblah]

If we can make it to the end of the year unbeaten, I feel we'll make it thru.
It SHOULD be us, Japan and the Saudis that progress, just the order will be the question.

Only top two progress directly to the World Cup. Third and fourth go to the Fourth Round.

[Stuckey]

If we can make it to the end of the year unbeaten, I feel we'll make it thru.
It SHOULD be us, Japan and the Saudis that progress, just the order will be the question.

Only top two progress directly to the World Cup. Third and fourth go to the Fourth Round.

Yeah I'm presuming 3rd place is a shoe in for first place next round.

[blahblah]

A few surprising results apart from ours.....

South Korea was held at home to a draw by Palestine
Saudi Arabia held at home to a draw by Indonesia (a result to give us the jitters)
China were hammed 0-7 at home by Japan (another result to give us the jitters)

[blahblah]

Deep into the third round now.

in Group A its really between Iran (16 points), Uzbekistan (13 points) and UAE (10 points) for the top two spots. Qatar are still in the hunt mathematically (7 points), but the goal difference between them and the UAE is 15.

In Group B is similar with South Korea (14), Iraq (11) and Jordan (9) fighting for the top two. Oman are again, mathematically in the hunt (5), but there is a 7 goal difference between them and Jordan.

Group C is an all-in brawl with Japan almost qualified (16) followed by Australia (7) and Indonesia, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and China all on 6. Anything could happen.

[Stuckey]

Hopefully for our sake we can finally string some results together with 2 win-able games coming up. Then Japan do us a favour knocking the Saudis off at home. If that takes place then that should see Japan qualified and then hopefully they'll send their B team to Aus in June and if we win that game we're looking good still. But I think we're still looking likely we'll have to get a result from our trip to Saudi.