2020 AFC U-16 Championship

2020 AFC U-16 Championship
Tournament details
Host country	Bahrain
Dates	25 November – 12 December
Teams	16 (from 1 confederation)
Venue(s)	3 (in 3 host cities)

The 2020 AFC U-16 Championship will be the 19th edition of the AFC U-16 Championship, the biennial international youth football championship organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) for the men's under-16 national teams of Asia. It will take place in Bahrain, which was appointed as the host by the AFC on 17 September 2019,[1] between 25 November and 12 December 2020, postponed from the original dates between 16 September and 3 October 2020.[2][3]

A total of 16 teams will play in the tournament. The top four teams of the tournament will qualify for the 2021 FIFA U-17 World Cup in Peru as the AFC representatives.

This edition will be the last to be played as an under-16 tournament, as the AFC have proposed switching the tournament from under-16 to under-17 starting from 2023.[4]

Japan are the defending champions.

Qualification

Qualifying was played from 14 – 22 September 2019.[5] Bahrain also participated in the qualifiers, even though they had already qualified automatically as hosts.

Qualified teams

The following 16 teams qualified for the final tournament.[6]

Team	Qualified as	Appearance	Previous best performance
Bahrain	Hosts	8th	Runners-up (1988)
Tajikistan	Group A winners	4th	Runners-up (2018)
India	Group B winners	9th	Quarter-finals (2002, 2018)
Iran	Group C winners	12th	Champions (2008)
Saudi Arabia	Group D winners	11th	Champions (1985, 1988)
Qatar	Group E winners	11th	Champions (1990)
United Arab Emirates	Group F winners	8th	Runners-up (1990)
China PR	Group G winners	15th	Champions (1992, 2004)
Australia	Group H winners	7th	Semi-finals (2010, 2014, 2018)
North Korea	Group I winners	12th	Champions (2010, 2014)
Japan	Group J winners	16th	Champions (1994, 2006, 2018)
South Korea	Group K winners	15th	Champions (1986, 2002)
Yemen	1st best runners-up	6th	Runners-up (2002)
Indonesia	2nd best runners-up	7th	Fourth place (1990)
Uzbekistan	3rd best runners-up	10th	Champions (2012)
Oman	4th best runners-up	11th	Champions (1996, 2000)

Venues

The tournament will be played in three venues:

Riffa	Isa Town	Muharraq
Bahrain National Stadium	Khalifa Sports City Stadium	Sheikh Ali Bin Mohammed Al Khalifa Stadium
Capacity: 30,000	Capacity: 20,000	Capacity: 10,000

Draw

The draw of the final tournament was held on 18 June 2020, 14:30 MYT (UTC+8), at the AFC House in Kuala Lumpur.[7][3] The 16 teams were drawn into four groups of four teams. The teams were seeded according to their performance in the 2018 AFC U-16 Championship final tournament and qualification, with the hosts Bahrain automatically seeded and assigned to Position A1 in the draw.

Pot 1	Pot 2	Pot 3	Pot 4
Bahrain (hosts) Japan Tajikistan South Korea	Australia North Korea Indonesia Oman	India Iran Yemen Saudi Arabia	China PR Uzbekistan Qatar United Arab Emirates

Squads

Players born on or after 1 January 2004 are eligible to compete in the tournament. Each team can register a maximum of 23 players (minimum three of whom must be goalkeepers).[8]

Group stage

The top two teams of each group advance to the quarter-finals.

Tiebreakers

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 (Regulations Article 9.3):[8]

Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
If more than two teams are 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 met 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);
Drawing of lots.

All times are local, AST (UTC+3).[9]

Schedule
Matchday	Dates	Matches
Matchday 1	25–27 November 2020	1 v 4, 2 v 3
Matchday 2	28–30 November 2020	4 v 2, 3 v 1
Matchday 3	1–3 December 2020	1 v 2, 3 v 4

Group A

Pos	Team	Qualification
1	Bahrain (H)	Knockout stage
2	North Korea	Knockout stage
3	Iran
4	Qatar

First match(es) will be played on 25 November 2020. Source: AFC
Rules for classification: Group stage tiebreakers
(H) Host.

25 November 2020