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| Kathmandu, Thursday August 14, 2003 Shrawan 29, 2060. |
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Nepal face Oman in Asian Cup
qualifying opener
Post Report
KATHMANDU, August 13 Nepal will take on Oman in
the opening match of the Asian Cup 2004 qualifiers, which will kick off in South Korea on
September 25, according to Asian Football Confederation (AFC).
The Asian Cup finals will be held in China from
July 17 next year. Nepal are grouped with South Korea, Vietnam and Oman in Group E in the
qualifying tournament, which will be played in two-legs.
The first leg will be played in South Korea and
the second leg in Muskat, Oman. Nepali squad will start training for the qualifiers on
Thursday under Maheswor Mulmi.
Nepal will take on Vietnam on September 27 while
South Korea will play Oman. On September 29, Nepal will play against World Cup
semi-finalist South Korea as Oman play Vietnam.
In October, the second leg of the qualifying
would be held in Muskat beginning with Nepal-Oman clash on October 19 followed by the
match between South Korea and Vietnam. On October 21, Nepal will play Vietnam while Oman
will play South Korea.
Nepal’s final match will be against mighty
South Korea on October 25. On the same day, Oman will take on Vietnam. The top two teams
from this group will qualify for the finals to be held in Beijing.
The Group A of the Asian Cup qualifiers features
Uzbekistan, Thailand, Tajikistan and Hong Kong, while Group B comprises Qatar, Kuwait,
Palestine and Singapore. Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Indonesia and Bhutan are in Group C, while
Iran, Jordan, Lebanon and North Korea will battle for the top two spots in Group D. Group
F comprises Iraq, Bahrain, Malaysia and Myanmar, while the teams in Group G are United
Arab Emirates, Syria, Turkmenistan and Sri Lanka. Hosts China and Japan have earned
automatic berths for the Asian Cup.
The two-leg qualifier should have been played on
home and away basis, but AFC, after considering requests from Oman and South Korea to hold
their fixtures at two venues thus curtailing the travel programme and obtaining agreement
from Nepal and Vietnam, decided to hold the first leg in South Korea and the second in
Oman.
This was later ratified during the recently held
AFC executive committee meeting at Kuala Lumpur.
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