Silent Lonesome Man

On 26 August 2022, a few weeks before the start of the U-20 Asian Cup qualifiers for the tournament in Uzbekistan 2023, AFC received a blowing shock: Australia, one of Asia's major football powers, renounced the rights to compete and would not send team to play. Despite plead by the AFC, the Australians refused to follow, for the Australians to rather abandon the U-20 World Cup instead of travelling. The reason? Iraq was the host. At the time of Australia's withdrawal, the Aussies repeatedly stated about insecurity in Iraq, notably due to unrest and violent protests related to Iraq's political climate. The Iraqis have not had a representative government, and still not by now. Australian reason was not unfounded, but the AFC was slow to address. Subsequently, Australia withdrew, causing the qualification in the whole turmoil, for now Australia's group only had three teams to compete: Iraq, Kuwait and India. Just a week later, the group H could not begin as expected. Iraq...

The AFC Champions League and AFC Cup practiced a very absurd system unseen by other confederations across the world. With the exception of CONCACAF and OFC, it is the only confederation to expand clubs to 40 teams in both tier. The last time having such a large amount of teams happened in the UEFA Europa League 2020-21 season, the last season to feature 48 teams before the creation of the UEFA Europa Conference League, the third-tier competition of European football. And yet UEFA only limited this expansion in the Europa League, not the Champions League. However, this system has proven to cost more than won. Instead of providing necessary revenues, the expansion has been done with little perpetration due to the ongoing plague of coronavirus pandemic. China, the most powerful nation in Asia economically, has made it difficult due to the country's strict adherence to zero-COVID, making many of these competitive games to be played with limited spectators. What's more to say is the...

After the 2022 AFC Women's Asian Cup, six slots for the upcoming 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup were decided: defending champions China, former world champions Japan, alongside South Korea, the Philippines, Vietnam and the joint-host nation, Australia, will take part. Among these participants, the Philippines and Vietnam will debut for the first time. But after the Asian Cup, one thing hangs in question: why does the AFC have no strategic plan to create an independent qualifier to the World Cup? And if it can do it one day, then how will it be? In term of women's football, Asia is among one of the most successful, second only to Europe. This has been the case since the first Women's World Cup held in China in 1991. Since then, two teams from this part, China and Japan, have jointly appeared in the final three times; the latter became the first Asian team to win the World Cup for the women in 2011. By this point, it should have been the inspiration for future success of Asi...

By the end of summer 2021, already twelve national teams have qualified for the upcoming Asian showpiece so far. With the hosts, China, as an exception, the remaining twelve are Qatar, Syria, Iraq, South Korea, Australia, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Lebanon, Oman, Japan, the United Arab Emirates and Iran. These teams are on their last ditch to take spots for the 2022 World Cup held in Qatar as well. For teams that could not make it to the World Cup, the Asian stage in China offers them another opportunities. The Asian Cup qualifiers have also been cut short, instead of a round-robin two legs format, it is now just a single group stage one leg to play for. Of course, this also reduced a great amount of intensity, but that doesn't mean teams are willing to miss the cakes. The qualification stage will be defined in six groups, each comprises four teams. The winners of these groups will progress to the Asian Cup directly, alongside the five best of six runners-up teams as well. Only eleven ...

On 20 February 2022, in the tourist islands-nation Maldives, two women's teams, both are less known to the world, marched into the pitch of Rasmee Dhandu Stadium in the capital Malé. That was no normal match however. It was a historic debut of the women's team of Saudi Arabia, the Middle Eastern Kingdom known for being strict and repressive toward women for decades. The opponents, Seychelles, is also a pretty less known African team, both in men's and women's level. In the end, the conservative met the unknown, and Saudi Arabia triumphed 2-0, courtesies by a corner kick strike from Al-Bandari Mubarak before Mariam Al-Tamimi doubled the lead. These ladies were the first-ever scorers for Saudi Arabia. 16 players were granted their historic debuts. Pelé, the greatest statue of international football, offered a congratulation on Twitter . When you get the congratulations from the Brazilian legend, it is certain that the country has won certification. Yet as CNN pointed out ...

Four goals. It was the last thing we saw from Vietnam as the game in Melbourne went off. Australia was not at the best of their organisation, due to its manager Graham Arnold was hit with COVID-19, and several key players could not board fly on time due to blizzard, for instance Aziz Behich, who was stuck in Giresun and could not return from his ancestral country Turkey to Australia. Without the full 100% strength and poor perpetration of the Socceroos, yet it was so devastating, Australia demolished Vietnam 4-0. This result was so hard to swallow. Even though everyone generally agreed that Australia would beat Vietnam due to the disparity of the strength, that result was so unbelievable since Australia was at the poorest situation. But what made it so painful to see was, the loss confirmed Vietnam the first team to be eliminated from the FIFA World Cup qualification in the Asian third round. The only thing Vietnamese could feel happy, well, would be the WCQ served as a perpetration fo...

A not-so-fond home return. Yes, I think we all know what does it mean. In November, a number of these teams will have homecomings, though with mixed feelings, except Iraq and Syria due to internal reasons. Australia bids a homecoming with a lot of emotions after two years of deserting elsewhere. China will come home after wandering for two months abroad. Lebanon will also return home after two years being absent. Yet both teams, no matter their levels, all face the wrath tests. Australia, a giant in the making, has to battle flying high Saudi Arabia. Lebanon's miraculous track is going to face a major big boy, Iran. China seems to be more relaxing, when Oman is its opponent, even though after four games, Oman has proven to be a serious dark-horse. There are also teams that have played home previously. South Korea will return for an important fixture against three points-hungry UAE, a game which the Koreans are surely holding the edge due to the UAE's poor forms. Vietnam will al...

Matchday 5 will mark the end of the 1st leg of the qualification campaign. And already now, some teams have known their fates. Is this clear or not, perhaps only they can find out. Group A Lebanon vs Iran No one could imagine that after four matches, it is Lebanon , and not the likes of Iraq, Syria and the UAE, that are really chasing behind Iran and South Korea for a place in Qatar 2022, standing third with five points, which might guarantee a playoff spot. It's somewhat hailed as a glorious achievement for a country that is already plundered into a massive economic and political crisis, the key reason why Lebanon has to play away for two months. But as much as Lebanese people have been hoping for, the upcoming home return, to be scheduled in the city of Sidon, is a do-or-die battle against Iran , a major Asian football force. The Iranians had just slipped out with an unwanted draw at home to South Korea. However, South Korea is also an equal opponent for Iran, so this draw is jus...

When the UEFA announced a new competition would take place, we wondered with a lot of questions. In the end, the UEFA really did: the establishment of the Nations League, modelled from the domestic leagues across the world, divided into four divisions: A, B, C, D. All 55 members were allowed to take place, and the league will act as alternative options for many countries to qualify for the UEFA European Championship, and to a lesser extent, the FIFA World Cup. The foundation of the UEFA Nations League was met with initial scepticism, but once the inaugural season began in 2018, it would become a massive success. Considering that the UEFA officials criticised the ineffectiveness of friendlies, it was quite realistic for the European football makers to have a new, competitive format. Soon after the UEFA did so, the CONCACAF - composed of countries from North America - also announced the same tournament. This left only three federations with little reforms in organising new football tourn...

Matchday 4 for any Asian football lovers will be a matchday to get addict with. It's not hard to realise there will be a major festival for football watchers, where major games will place teams in a serious gamble for wins or the losers take all. Group A United Arab Emirates vs Iraq Gaining only two points out of three games, both the UAE and Iraq are under tremendous pressures to gain a win to restart their already struggling campaigns, hence the upcoming 12 October face up is going to be a square off in Dubai's Zabeel Stadium. The UAE and Iraq are no stranger as they share common culture, language and has also squeezed off several times in major competitions, not to say even common managerial philosophy. The UAE, led by Dutchman Bert van Marwijk, has been unable to produce the same performance it did in the second round comeback, getting with only a goal scored by none other than Ali Mabkhout. The UAE's resistance to Iran was a bright point, as the Emiratis succumbed to o...