Thailand (Group A) Saudi Arabia (Group B) Kyrgyzstan (Group C) Mongolia (Group D) Tajikistan (Group E) Bahrain (Group F) Uzbekistan (Group G) Chinese Taipei (Group H)
The 2024 AFC Futsal Asian Cup qualification was the qualification process organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) to determine the participating teams for the 2024 AFC Futsal Asian Cup, the 17th edition of the international men's futsal championship of Asia.
A total of 16 teams qualified to play in the final tournament in Thailand. The host country Thailand qualified automatically, while the other 15 teams were decided by qualification, with the matches played between 7–13 October 2023 in centralised venues.
This tournament also served as the first stage of Asian qualification for the 2024 FIFA Futsal World Cup, where five teams from the Futsal Asian Cup qualify directly for the World Cup (plus hosts Uzbekistan).
The AFC Executive Committee had approved several strategic recommendations put forward by the AFC Competitions Committee, one of which was the removal of zoning principles in the AFC's Futsal and Beach Soccer competitions.[1]
The 46 AFC member associations were eligible to enter the qualification after Sri Lanka was barred from participating in international competitions due to FIFA suspension before the draw.[2][3] The Northern Mariana Islands, whose association are not FIFA members, were not be eligible to qualify for the 2024 FIFA Futsal World Cup.
Only 30 teams including China, India and Macau who did not participate in the previous edition, entered the competition. Thailand automatically qualified for the final tournament as hosts, but decided to also participate in the qualifying competition. 17 teams including Turkmenistan who withdrew after the draw plus Oman and United Arab Emirates who did participate in the previous edition, did not enter to the qualification and were listed below. The following teams with asterisks are the teams never entered the qualification.
31 teams including Turkmenistan who withdrew after the draw and Thailand who automatically qualified as hosts after the draw, were seeded into four pots based on the their performance at the qualification and the final tournament of the previous edition.[5] The eight hosts of the qualification including Indonesia who withdrew the hosts after the draw, were placed into the host pots.
Teams who participated in the final tournament of the previous edition were ranked from the 1st to the 15th by their performance at that tournament and other teams who participated in the qualification of the previous edition were ranked from the 16th to 27th by their performance at that tournament. China, India and Macau who did not participate in the previous edition, were unranked.
^Teams are ranked in descending order as follows: goal difference in the quarter-finals, goals scored in the quarter-finals and the procedure used same as the teams eliminated in the group stage.[6]
^Teams are ranked in descending order as follows: position in the group stage, points, goal difference, goals scored and disciplinary points in all group matches and drawing of lots.[6]
^ abTeams are ranked in descending order as follows: position in the group stage, points in same number of group matches among the teams with same group position, goal difference in same number of group matches among the teams with same group position, goals scored in same number of group matches among the teams with same group position, disciplinary points in same number of group matches among the teams with same group position and drawing of lots. [6]
The 31 teams including Turkmenistan who withdrew after the draw and Thailand who automatically qualified as hosts after the draw, were drawn into six groups of four teams and two groups of three teams.
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:[7]
Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
If more than two teams were 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 are playing each other 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);
Thailand already qualified to the final tournament as host country, so their matches were not taken into account when calculating the group ranking. Then, Turkmenistan withdrew after the draw. Since only two teams were competing, a total of two games were played between China and Hong Kong.
The seven best second-placed teams from the eight groups advanced to the final tournament along with the eight group winners. Due to fewer matches in groups A and H, results against the fourth-placed teams of each group C to G were not counted in determining the ranking of the second-placed teams.