2018 AFC Futsal Championship qualification

2018 AFC Futsal Championship qualification
Tournament details
Host countries	Vietnam (ASEAN); Thailand (East and West); Iran (South & Central)
Dates	15 October – 12 November 2017
Teams	29 (from 1 confederation)
Tournament statistics
Matches played	44
Goals scored	391 (8.89 per match)
Attendance	19,982 (454 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Pyae Phyo Maung (11 goals)
	← 2016 2020 →

The 2018 AFC Futsal Championship qualification is the qualification process organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) to determine the participating teams for the 2018 AFC Futsal Championship, the 15th edition of the international men's futsal championship of Asia.^[2]

A total of 16 teams qualify to play in the final tournament, including Chinese Taipei who qualified automatically as hosts.^[3]

The qualification process will be divided to four zones, where the ASEAN Zone doubled as the 2017 AFF Futsal Championship, the East Zone and West Zone will be played in Thailand, and the South Zone were merged to Central Zone after Nepal was the only team from South Zone.

Qualification process

Of the 47 AFC member associations, a total of 29 teams entered the competition. The 16 spots in the final tournament are distributed as follows:

Host : 1 spot
ASEAN Zone : 4 spots
South & Central Zone : 4 spots (the two zones were merged since Nepal was the only team from South Zone)
West Zone : 4 spots
East Zone : 3 spots

As the final tournament hosts had not been announced at the time of the qualifying draw, the hosts Chinese Taipei were also included in the draw. Despite having automatically qualified for the final tournament, they may still decide to participate in qualification, and if they finish in one of the qualification spots, the next best team in their zone (East) advances to play-off.

Draw

Seeding

East Zone ranking
Team	Final	Qual
Japan	7	1
China	10	2
Chinese Taipei	13	3
South Korea	—	4
Mongolia	—	5
Hong Kong	—	6
Macau	—	—

South & Central Zone ranking
Team	Final	Qual
Iran	1	1
Uzbekistan	2	2
Kyrgyzstan	6	3
Tajikistan	14	4
Afghanistan	—	5
Turkmenistan	—	6
Nepal	—	—

West Zone ranking
Team	Final	Qual
Iraq	8	1
Qatar	9	2
Lebanon	11	3
Saudi Arabia	12	4
Jordan	15	5
United Arab Emirates	—	6
Bahrain	—	7
Syria	—	—

ASEAN Zone ranking
Team	Final	Zone
Thailand	3	1
Myanmar	—	2
Malaysia	16	3
East Timor	—	4
Indonesia	—	5
Brunei	—
Laos	—
Vietnam	4	—
Australia	5	—
Philippines	—	—

AFF Draw

The original draw for the 2017 AFF Futsal Championship was held on 17 February 2017, 10:00 MMT (UTC+06:30) during the AFF Council Meeting at the Novotel Yangon Max Hotel in Yangon, Myanmar.^[4] After Australia withdrew from the competition, a re-draw was held on 23 September 2017 during the AFF Council Meeting in Bali, Indonesia.^[5]

The teams were seeded according to their performance in the 2016 AFF Futsal Championship tournament.

Pot 1	Pot 2	Pot 3
Vietnam (H) Thailand	Myanmar Malaysia	Brunei Indonesia Laos Philippines* East Timor*

Notes

(*) Not vying for qualification but will still play matches.^[6]
Teams in bold qualified for the final tournament.

AFC Draw

The draw was held on 6 July 2017, 15:00 MYT (UTC+8), at the AFC House in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia,^[7]^[8] except for the ASEAN Zone which uses the 2017 AFF Futsal Championship as their qualification tournament and whose draw had already been held. The mechanism for each zone is as follows:

East Zone : seven teams from East Asia, were drawn into one group of four teams and one group of three teams.
South & Central Zone : seven teams from South Asia and Central Asia, were drawn into one group of four teams and one group of three teams.
West Zone : eight teams from West Asia, were drawn into two groups of four teams.

The teams were seeded according to their performance in the 2016 AFC Futsal Championship final tournament and qualification.

	Pot 1	Pot 2	Pot 3	Pot 4
East Zone Host: Thailand	Japan China	Chinese Taipei South Korea	Mongolia Hong Kong Macau
South & Central Zone Host: Iran	Iran Uzbekistan	Kyrgyzstan Tajikistan	Afghanistan Turkmenistan Nepal
West Zone Host: Thailand	Iraq Qatar	Lebanon Saudi Arabia	Jordan	United Arab Emirates Bahrain Syria

Notes

Teams in bold qualified for the final tournament.

Did not enter
ASEAN Zone	Australia (withdrew)^[9] Cambodia Philippines (competing but not vying for qualification)^[6] East Timor (competing but not vying for qualification)^[6]
East Zone	Guam Northern Mariana Islands North Korea
South & Central Zone	Bangladesh Bhutan India Maldives Pakistan Sri Lanka
West Zone	Kuwait (suspended)^[10] Oman Palestine Yemen

Format

In each group, teams play each other once at a centralised venue; except ASEAN Zone, South & Central Zone.

Tiebreakers

Teams are ranked according to points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss), and if tied on points, the following tiebreaking criteria are applied, in the order given, to determine the rankings (Regulations Article 11.5):^[2]

Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
If more than two teams are tied, and after applying all head-to-head criteria above, a subset of teams are still tied, all head-to-head criteria above are reapplied exclusively to this subset of teams;
Goal difference in all group matches;
Goals scored in all group matches;
Penalty shoot-out if only two teams are tied and they met in the last round of the group;
Disciplinary points (yellow card = 1 point, red card as a result of two yellow cards = 3 points, direct red card = 3 points, yellow card followed by direct red card = 4 points);
Drawing of lots.

ASEAN Zone

The (AFC) matches are played between 26 October and 30 October 2017.
All matches are held in Vietnam.
Times listed are UTC+7.
In the event the Philippines, Timor Leste or both finish among the top two teams in their group the next best team/s qualify for the final tournament instead since both countries did not submit their entries for the 2018 AFC Futsal Championship.^[6]

Schedule
Matchday	Dates		Matches
Matchday	Group A	Group B	Group A	Group B
Matchday 1	26 October 2017	26 October 2017	3 v 2, 4 v 5	3 v 2, 4 v 1
Matchday 2	27 October 2017	27 October 2017	4 v 1, 5 v 3	3 v 1, 4 v 2
Matchday 3	28 October 2017	28 October 2017	1 v 5, 4 v 2	1 v 2, 3 v 4
Matchday 4	29 October 2017		2 v 5, 3 v 1
Matchday 5	30 October 2017		3 v 4, 2 v 1

Group A

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Vietnam (H)	4	4	0	49	3	+46	12	Semi-finals and 2018 AFC Futsal Championship
2	Myanmar	4	3	1	41	5	+36	9	Semi-finals and 2018 AFC Futsal Championship
3	Indonesia	4	2	2	35	7	+28	6
4	Brunei	4	1	3	5	40	−35	3
5	Philippines^[a]	4	0	4	0	75	−75	0

Source: AFC & AFF
Rules for classification: Qualification tiebreakers
(H) Hosts
Notes:

^ Philippines are not eligible for AFC Futsal Championship qualification.^[11]

26 October 2017

12:00

Brunei	0–13	Myanmar
	Report	Phyo Maung (FW) 3', 14', 14', 28' Pyone Aung 7', 7' Min Tun 10' Aung Aung 16', 38' Zin Oo 20' Ye Kyaw 27', 29' Kyaw Tun 36'

Phú Thọ Indoor Stadium, Ho Chi Minh City

Attendance: 50

Referee: Osama Saeed Idrees (Bahrain)

26 October 2017