U23 Vietnam 'on the same level' as Korea and Australia at the Asian tournament

U23 Vietnam was seeded second with strong teams such as Korea, Australia, and Qatar at the 2026 AFC U23 Championship draw.

The draw ceremony for the 2026 AFC U23 Championship will be held at 2:00 p.m. on October 2 (Vietnam time) at the AFC headquarters in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

According to the seeding principle, Saudi Arabia, as the host, is automatically placed in pot 1. The remaining 15 teams are divided into 4 pots based on their performance in the last 3 finals, with the corresponding scoring coefficient: 100% for the 2024 tournament, 50% for the 2022 tournament and 25% for the 2020 tournament.

U23 Vietnam participated in the U23 Asian Cup for the 6th consecutive time.

Accordingly, seed groups are identified as follows:

Group 1: Saudi Arabia (host), Uzbekistan (ranked 1st), Japan (ranked 2nd), Iraq (ranked 3rd).

Group 2: Korea (ranked 5th), Vietnam (ranked 6th), Australia (ranked 7th), Qatar (ranked 8th).

Group 3: Thailand (ranked 9th), Jordan (ranked 10th), UAE (ranked 11th), Iran (ranked 12th).

Group 4: China (ranked 13th), Syria (ranked 14th), Kyrgyzstan (ranked 15th), Lebanon (ranked 16th).

Being seeded as the second seed of the tournament, U23 Vietnam has a certain advantage when drawing lots to divide the groups. According to the competition format, 16 teams participating in the final round are divided into 4 groups. The top two teams in each group will qualify for the quarter-finals. The final match is scheduled to take place on January 25, 2026.

Vietnam U23 won a ticket to the final round after defeating Bangladesh 2-0, Singapore 1-0 and Yemen 1-0 to top the group with 9 absolute points. This is the sixth consecutive time Vietnam U23 has participated in the AFC U23 Championship.

The 2026 AFC U23 Championship will take place from January 7 to January 25, 2026 in Saudi Arabia.

Source: https://vietnamnet.vn/u23-viet-nam-cung-mam-voi-han-quoc-australia-tai-giai-chau-a-2447219.html