The Asian Football Thread

Overseas Football
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Mariner v Mariner action!

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Can somebody explain the new Champions League ā€˜Eliteā€™ format for me?

So the Mariners are in a group with 11 other clubs from the ā€˜Easternā€™ side of Asia, however only play 8 teams, in a random home-away structure?

How come they donā€™t play all 11 other teams in the competition?

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Presumably so that the elite draw can randomly provide favourable draws for the preferred teams.

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Basically so the countries with three teams in ACLE donā€™t play teams from their own country.
And as a result of being drawn with South Korea, the Mariners donā€™t face any SK teams in the league stage.

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So while weā€™re all still digesting that abysmal performance from us last night, hereā€™s the results from around the grounds:

Group A:
Uzbekistan 1-0 North Korea
Iran 1-0 Kyrgyzstan
Qatar 1-3 United Arab Emirates

Group B:
South Korea 0-0 Palestine
Iraq 1-0 Oman
Jordan 1-1 Kuwait

Group C:
Japan 7-0 China
Saudi Arabia 1-1 Indonesia

So a few interesting results there. Japan is the only team really who comfortably beat their opponents. Saudi Arabia and Indonesia drawing is beneficial. South Korea only going 0-0 with Palestine, at home is interesting.

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I was thinking this last night. Its not that often we drop points at home to lesser football nations like Bahrain, and weā€™d have to wait and see how the night panned out. Bahrain will likely prove troublesome for Japan and Saudi Arabia, as well. They could well take a few points off one or both of them.

Always good to see Qatar get done.

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Did i hear right that Bahrain hasnā€™t scored against Australia for 18 years until last night?

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They still havenā€™t. It was an own goal.