National Team - Lions ● Feb 17, 2022
Draw for AFC Asian Cup 2023 Qualifiers Final Round to be held on 24 February
Hariss Harun and Ikhsan Fandi, 14 December 2021
SINGAPORE, 17 FEBRUARY 2022 – The Lions will discover their opponents in the third and final round of qualification for the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) Asian Cup China 2023™ in one week’s time.
The AFC announced earlier today that the draw for the AFC Asian Cup China 2023™ Qualifiers (Final Round) will be conducted virtually and streamed online on 24 February at 3pm in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Singapore have been placed in Pot 4 and will be part of the 24 teams that will be divided into six groups. Each of these groups will be hosted by one of the following six countries, which will serve as centralised venues: India, Kuwait, Kyrgyz Republic, Malaysia, Mongolia or Uzbekistan.
The pots were made based on the latest FIFA rankings on 10 February. The six host countries will be placed in a separate “Hosts” pot in order to draw them into different groups at the beginning of the draw. Each of them will be drawn to the same position as reflected in their original seeding; as such, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyz Republic and India will be placed in position 1 of their Final Round groups, with Kuwait, Malaysia and Mongolia to fill positions 2, 3 and 4 of their respective groups. The full pot groupings can be seen below.
| Pot 1 | Bahrain, Jordan, Palestine |
| Pot 2 | Thailand, Tajikistan, Philippines, Turkmenistan, Hong Kong |
| Pot 3 | Afghanistan, Yemen, Myanmar, Maldives, Indonesia |
| Pot 4 | Singapore, Nepal, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka |
| Hosts Pot | Uzbekistan, Kyrgyz Republic, India, Kuwait, Malaysia, Mongolia |
The pot number represents the position the team shall be placed in the group. The first, second, third, fourth, fifth and sixth team drawn from each pot shall be placed in Groups A, B, C, D, E and F respectively. The sequence in which the pots will be drawn are: Hosts, 4, 3, 2, 1. Each group will feature one team from Pots 1 to 4. More information on the draw mechanics can be found here.
All the matches will be played in June due to the COVID-19 pandemic and a single round-robin format will be utilised with matchdays on the 8th, 11th and 14th. The six group winners and five best second-placed teams will advance to the China 2023 Finals. They will join 12 teams that have already qualified, including hosts China PR.
Singapore will be aiming to reach the Asian Cup for only the second time in their history, after their sole appearance in 1984 as hosts.
