Asian Football Confederation
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Asian Football Confederation

AFC logo
AFC members
Motto	"The Future is Asia"
Formation	1954
Type	Sports organization
Headquarters	Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Membership	46 member associations (from 4 regional federations)
President	Mohammed Bin Hammam
Website	http://www.the-afc.com

The 46 member Asian Football Confederation (AFC) is the governing body of football in Asia, excluding Cyprus and Israel, and including Australia.

The AFC was founded in 1954 in Manila, Philippines, and is one of FIFA's six continental confederations. (Nations with both European and Asian territory, such as Turkey, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, and Russia, are instead covered by UEFA; Israel, which lies entirely in Asia, is also a UEFA member.) The main headquarters is located in Bukit Jalil, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The current president is Mohammed Bin Hammam of Qatar.

AFC competitions

The latest champions of the AFC is Iraq. 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 nations 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 Asian Cup, first held in 1975, as well as the AFC's AFC U-19 Women's Championship and the AFC U-17 Women's Championship.

Regions

The AFC is split into four 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 article: ASEAN Football Federation

•  Australia
•  Brunei
•  Cambodia
•  Timor-Leste
•  Indonesia
•  Laos
•  Malaysia
•  Myanmar
•  Philippines
•  Singapore
•  Thailand
•  Vietnam

East Asian Football Federation

Main article: East Asian Football Federation

•  China PR
•  Hong Kong
•  Guam
•  Japan
•  Chinese Taipei (Taiwan)
•  Korea DPR
•  Korea Republic
•  Macau
•  Mongolia
•  Northern Mariana Islands (provisional)

West Asian Football Federation

Main article: West Asian Football Federation

•  Bahrain

•  Iran
•  Iraq
•  Jordan
•  Kuwait
•  Lebanon
•  Oman
•  Palestine
•  Qatar
•  Saudi Arabia
•  Syria
•  United Arab Emirates
•  Yemen

Central and South Asian Football Federation

Main article: Central and South Asian Football Federation

•  Afghanistan*
•  Bangladesh*
•  Bhutan*
•  India*
•  Kyrgyzstan^
•  Maldives*
•  Nepal*
•  Pakistan*
•  Sri Lanka*
•  Tajikistan^
•  Turkmenistan^
•  Uzbekistan^

(*South Asian Football Federation (SAFF) members)
(^Central Asian Football Federation (CAFF) members)

Competitions

AFC tournaments

Regional tournaments

• ASEAN: ASEAN Football Championship (formerly 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

Awards

Asian Footballer of the Year

The Asian Footballer of the Year award is presented to the best football player from Asia. Officially awarded since 1994. The official name is Asian Football Confederation's Sanyo Player of the Year Award. Prior to 1994 it was awarded on an unofficial basis. The winners from 1988 to 1991 were chosen by IFFHS.

Year	Footballer	Nation	Club
1988	Ahmed Radhi	Iraq	Al-Rasheed
1989	Kim Joo-Sung	Korea Republic	Daewoo Royals
1990	Kim Joo-Sung	Korea Republic	Daewoo Royals
1991	Kim Joo-Sung	Korea Republic	Daewoo Royals
1992		No award
1993	Kazuyoshi Miura	Japan	Verdy Kawasaki
1994	Saeed Owairan	Saudi Arabia	Al-Shabab
1995	Masami Ihara	Japan	Yokohama Marinos
1996	Khodadad Azizi	Iran	Bahman
1997	Hidetoshi Nakata	Japan	Bellmare Hiratsuka
1998	Hidetoshi Nakata	Japan	Perugia
1999	Ali Daei	Iran	Hertha Berlin
2000	Nawaf Al Temyat	Saudi Arabia	Al-Hilal
2001	Fan Zhiyi	China PR	Dundee
2002	Shinji Ono	Japan	Feyenoord
2003	Mehdi Mahdavikia	Iran	Hamburger SV
2004	Ali Karimi	Iran	Al-Ahli
2005	Hamad Al-Montashari	Saudi Arabia	Al-Ittihad
2006	Khalfan Ibrahim	Qatar	Al-Sadd
2007	Yasser Al-Qahtani	Saudi Arabia	Al-Hilal

Wins By Country

Nation	Winners
Japan	5
Iran	4
Saudi Arabia	4
Korea Republic	3
China PR	1
Iraq	1
Qatar	1

Asian Young Footballer of the Year

The Asian Young Footballer of the Year award is presented to the best young football player from Asia. Officially awarded since 1995.

Year	Footballer	Nation	Club
1995	Mohamed Amor Al Kathri	Oman
1996	Bamrong Boonprom	Thailand	Bangkok Bank
1997	Mehdi Mahdavikia	Iran	Persepolis
1998	Shinji Ono	Japan	Urawa Red Diamonds
1999	Waleed Hamzah	Qatar	Al-Arabi
2000	Ryoichi Maeda	Japan	Jubilo Iwata
2001	Du Wei	China	Shanghai Shenhua
2002	Lee Chun-Soo	South Korea	Ulsan Tigers
2003	Yoshito Okubo	Japan	Cerezo Osaka
2004	Park Chu-Young	South Korea	Korea University
2005	Choe Myong-Ho	North Korea	Kyonggongop
2006	Ma Xiaoxu	China	Dalian Shide
2007	Kim Kum-Il	North Korea	April 25 Sports Group

Wins By Country

Nation	Winners
Japan	3
China	2
North Korea	2
South Korea	2
Iran	1
Oman	1
Thailand	1
Iraq	1

World Cup qualifiers

The following table shows the AFC representatives at each edition of the FIFA World Cup, sorted by number of appearances.

Team	1930	1934	1938	1950	1954	1958	1962	1966	1970	1974	1978	1982	1986	1990	1994	1998	2002	2006	2010	2014	Total
Korea Republic					•								•	•	•	•	•	•			7
Saudi Arabia															•	•	•	•			4
Iran											•					•		•			3
Japan																•	•	•			3
Australia1										•								•			2
China PR																	•				1
India				•																	1
Indonesia			•																		1
Iraq													•								1
Korea DPR								•													1
Kuwait												•									1
United Arab Emirates														•							1
Israel2									•												1
Total	0	0	1	1	1	0	0	1	1	1	1	1	2	2	2	4	4	5			27

¹Australia qualified in 2006 under the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC). From 1972 to 1978 they were not a member of any confederation.

²Israel is now a member of UEFA.

• 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 FIFA would not let them play barefoot)^{citation needed}
• 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 – Australia (qualified as an OFC representative), Iran, Japan, Korea Republic, Saudi Arabia

Totals (current members)

• 7:
   Korea Republic
• 4:
   Saudi Arabia
• 3:
   Iran
   Japan
• 2:
   Australia (qualified in 1974 while not a member of any confederation and in 2006 via the OFC, although they joined the AFC before the finals)
• 1:
   China PR
   India (withdrew after qualifying)
   Indonesia (as Dutch East Indies)
   Iraq
   Korea DPR
   Kuwait
   United Arab Emirates
   Israel (incl. 1 as AFC member)

References

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