2007 AFC Asian Cup

2007 AFC Asian Cup

Piala Asia 2007 เอเชียนคัพ 2550 Cúp bóng đá châu Á 2007
Tournament details
Host countries	Indonesia Malaysia Thailand Vietnam
Dates	7–29 July
Teams	16 (from 1 confederation)
Venue(s)	8 (in 7 host cities)
Final positions
Champions	Iraq (1st title)
Runners-up	Saudi Arabia
Third place	South Korea
Fourth place	Japan
Tournament statistics
Matches played	32
Goals scored	84 (2.63 per match)
Attendance	724,222 (22,632 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Younis Mahmoud Naohiro Takahara Yasser Al-Qahtani (4 goals each)
Best player(s)	Younis Mahmoud[1]
Best goalkeeper	Noor Sabri[1]
Fair play award	Japan[1]
← 2004 2011 →

The 2007 AFC Asian Cup was the 14th edition of the men's AFC Asian Cup, a quadrennial international football tournament organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). The finals were held from 7 to 29 July 2007. For the first time in its history, the competition was co-hosted by four countries in Southeast Asia: Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam; it was the first time in football history that more than two countries joined as hosts of a major continental competition and the only one to have ever taken place until the UEFA Euro 2020.

Iraq won the continental title for the first time after defeating three-time champion Saudi Arabia 1–0 in the final. As the winner, Iraq represented the AFC in the 2009 FIFA Confederations Cup.

Before 2007 and every four years, Asia often held its continental tournament from 1956 until China in 2004. With the Summer Olympic Games and the European Football Championship also held in the same year as the Asian Cup, the AFC changed their tradition. From 2007, AFC decided to hold its continental tournament a year earlier, and every four years henceforth from that date.

An estimated worldwide television audience of 650 million people tuned in to watch the 2007 AFC Asian Cup.^[2]

Australia participated for the first time since moving to the AFC from the OFC. Australia also happened to be the tournament's first nation aside from the co-hosts to qualify for the 2007 Asian Cup.

City	Stadium	Capacity
Bangkok	Rajamangala Stadium	49,722
	Supachalasai Stadium	19,793
Hanoi	Mỹ Đình National Stadium	40,192
Ho Chi Minh City	Army Stadium	25,000
Jakarta	Gelora Bung Karno Stadium	88,083
Kuala Lumpur	Bukit Jalil National Stadium	87,411
Palembang	Gelora Sriwijaya Stadium	30,000
Shah Alam	Shah Alam Stadium	80,372

The qualification ran from 22 February 2006 to 15 November 2006. For the first time, the defending champions (in this tournament, Japan) did not get an automatic qualification. Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, and Vietnam automatically qualified as co-hosts. Twenty-four teams were split into six groups of four to compete for the 12 remaining spots in the final tournament.

Team	Qualified as	Date qualification was secured	Previous appearances in tournament1, 2
Indonesia	00Co-hosts	7 August 2004	3 (1996, 2000, 2004)
Malaysia			2 (1976, 1980)
Thailand			5 (1972, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Vietnam3			2 (19564, 19604)
Australia	Group D winner	16 August 2006	0 (debut)
Qatar	Group F winner	6 September 2006	6 (1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 2000, 2004)
Japan	Group A winner		5 (1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Saudi Arabia	Group A runner-up		6 (1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Iran	Group B winner	11 October 2006	10 (1968, 1972, 1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)
South Korea	Group B runner-up		10 (1956, 1960, 1964, 1972, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1996, 2000, 2004)
United Arab Emirates	Group C winner		6 (1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2004)
Oman	Group C runner-up		1 (2004)
Iraq	Group E winner		5 (1972, 1976, 1996, 2000, 2004)
China	Group E runner-up		8 (1976, 1980, 1984, 1988, 1992, 1996, 2000, 2004)
Bahrain	Group D runner-up	15 November 2006	2 (1988, 2004)
Uzbekistan	Group F runner-up		3 (1996, 2000, 2004)

¹ Bold indicates champion for that year

² Italic indicates host

³ Vietnam's debut since the reunification of Vietnam in 1976

⁴ As South Vietnam

For the first time, the seeds are based on the October 2006 FIFA World Rankings instead of the basis of the performance from the previous AFC Asian Cup competition. This was to ensure that the same number of strong teams do not meet in the early stage.^[3]

The four seeded teams were announced on 19 December 2006. The seeds comprised Pot 4 in the draw. Pot 1 consists of the teams from all co-hosts.

Pot 1	Pot 2	Pot 3	Pot 4
Indonesia (153)  Malaysia (152)  Thailand (137)  Vietnam (172)	China (84)  Iraq (83)  United Arab Emirates (87)  Bahrain (97)	Qatar (58)  Uzbekistan (45)  Saudi Arabia (64)  Oman (72)	Australia (39)  Iran (38)  Japan (47)  South Korea (51)

The draw was held on 19 December 2006 at the Kuala Lumpur Convention Centre.

16 referees and 24 assistant referees were officially cleared following a fitness test on 2 July in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. One referee and two assistant referees were also named from the CAF.^[4]

(†): Replaced Shamsul Maidin after he pulled out with injury.^[5]

The Asian Cup saw many upsets in the early stages of the tournament, with tournament favourites Australia and South Korea performing poorly in the group stage.

In Group A, Oman held the Socceroos to a surprising draw. The Omanis took the lead and would have won, if not for an injury time goal from Tim Cahill. Next, joint hosts and the lowest-ranked team in the competition, Vietnam, shocked the UAE with a 2–0 victory. In the same group, Qatar held Japan to a shock 1–1 draw. The result caused Japan's coach Ivica Osim to fly into a rage in which he branded his players as 'amateurs' and reduced his interpreter to tears.^[6] In Group D, Indonesia continued the undefeated streak of the hosts by defeating Bahrain 2–1. Malaysia ended up as the only host country to lose their opening match after a crushing 5-1 defeat to China. Thailand recorded just their 2nd win in the Asian Cup finals (their other was in 1972 against Cambodia), and its first ever win in regulation, when they beat Oman 2–0 on 12 July. Meanwhile, Australia was upset by a 3–1 defeat to Iraq the following day, leaving them floundering in the tournament despite high expectations in third place. However, Australia's 4–0 demolition of Thailand at the last match day saw them into the quarter-finals, as Oman was unable to overcome Iraq in a goalless draw.

Vietnam continued to stun all predictions when they drew 1-1 with 2006 ASIAD champions Qatar, while Japan finally got their first win when they thrashed the UAE 3–1. Although Vietnam lost 1–4 to Japan, the UAE's 2–1 comeback win over Qatar witnessed Vietnam's first time ever to qualify into the next round and became the only host to progress through despite being in the group of three different champions. On the other hand, while Malaysia continued its poor form with 0–5 and 0–2 losses to Uzbekistan and Iran, thus going out of the tournament without a point. China's shocking elimination occurred when they were hammered 0–3 by the Uzbeks, despite having drawn 2–2 with Iran and was expected to qualify from group stage with an easy win.

Bahrain shocked the whole tournament by defeating South Korea 2–1 in Group D, leaving the Koreans in the verge of elimination when Indonesia was beaten 1–2 by Saudi Arabia. However, South Korea finally progressed with a 1–0 win over hosts Indonesia and with Saudi Arabia destroying Bahrain 4–0, it was enough to seal them in.

In the quarter-finals, Iraq defeated Vietnam 2–0, while South Korea needed a penalty shootout to eliminate Iran 4–2. Japan also needed a penalty shootout to defeat Australia 4–3 (this was the first time Australia's goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer had ever come out on the losing end of a penalty shoot-out), and Saudi Arabia won over Uzbekistan 2–1. Iraq upset the Koreans in the semi-finals by winning 4–3 on penalties, resulting in thousands of Iraqis celebrating in the streets of Baghdad. Over 50 Iraqis were killed by terrorist bombs targeting these crowds.^[7] In the other semi-finals, Saudi Arabia eliminated defending champions Japan after a 3–2 win to make an all-Arab affair for the final match.

Iraq went on to defeat the Saudis 1–0, taking the Asian Cup title. Iraqi forward and captain Younis Mahmoud was given the title of Most Valuable Player. South Korea took third place, narrowly beating Japan 6–5 on penalties. It was the third consecutive match in the tournament that South Korea drew 0–0 before a penalty shootout. Iraq, Saudi Arabia and South Korea, as the top three teams in the tournament, all received automatic berths to the 2011 Asian Cup along with the next hosts Qatar.^[8]

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Iraq	3	1	2	0	4	2	+2	5	Advance to knockout stage
2	Australia	3	1	1	1	6	4	+2	4
3	Thailand (H)	3	1	1	1	3	5	−2	4
4	Oman	3	0	2	1	1	3	−2	2

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Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Japan	3	2	1	0	8	3	+5	7	Advance to knockout stage
2	Vietnam (H)	3	1	1	1	4	5	−1	4
3	United Arab Emirates	3	1	0	2	3	6	−3	3
4	Qatar	3	0	2	1	3	4	−1	2

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Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Iran	3	2	1	0	6	3	+3	7	Advance to knockout stage
2	Uzbekistan	3	2	0	1	9	2	+7	6
3	China	3	1	1	1	7	6	+1	4
4	Malaysia (H)	3	0	0	3	1	12	−11	0

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Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts	Qualification
1	Saudi Arabia	3	2	1	0	7	2	+5	7	Advance to knockout stage
2	South Korea	3	1	1	1	3	3	0	4
3	Indonesia (H)	3	1	0	2	3	4	−1	3
4	Bahrain	3	1	0	2	3	7	−4	3

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	Quarter-finals				Semi-finals				Final
	21 July – Bangkok
	Iraq	2
					25 July – Kuala Lumpur
	Vietnam	0
					Iraq (pen.)	0 (4)
	22 July – Kuala Lumpur
					South Korea	0 (3)
	Iran	0 (2)
									29 July – Jakarta
	South Korea (pen.)	0 (4)
									Iraq	1
	21 July – Hanoi
									Saudi Arabia	0
	Japan (pen.)	1 (4)
					25 July – Hanoi
	Australia	1 (3)
					Japan	2
	22 July – Jakarta
					Saudi Arabia	3			Third place
	Saudi Arabia	2
									28 July – Palembang
	Uzbekistan	1
									South Korea (pen.)	0 (6)
									Japan	0 (5)

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With four goals, Younis Mahmoud, Naohiro Takahara and Yasser Al-Qahtani are the top scorers in the tournament. In total, 84 goals were scored by 57 different players, with two of them credited as own goals.

4 goals

3 goals

2 goals

1 goal

1 own goal

Most Valuable Player^[1]

• Younis Mahmoud

Top scorer

• Younis Mahmoud
• Yasser Al-Qahtani
• Naohiro Takahara

Best Goalkeeper^[1]

• Noor Sabri

Best Defender^[1]

• Bassim Abbas

Fair Play Award^[1]

•  Japan

Most Entertaining Team^[1]

•  Iraq

Team of the tournament

The Toshiba All-Star XI was voted for by fans on the official Asian Cup website.^[9][10]

Goalkeeper	Defenders	Midfielders	Forwards
Lee Woon-jae	Bassim Abbas Yuji Nakazawa Rahman Rezaei Lucas Neill	Shunsuke Nakamura Harry Kewell Lee Chun-soo Nashat Akram	Naohiro Takahara Yasser Al-Qahtani

The Official Match Ball for the 2007 AFC Asian Cup was launched by Nike on 15 May 2007, making it the first time ever that a ball had been launched specifically for any football competition in Asia.^[11] The Nike Mercurial Veloci AC features four blue stripes with gold trim with each host city's name inscribed, as well as the AFC Asian Cup logo.^[12]

The AFC selected "I Believe", a 2004 single by Thai singer Tata Young as the tournament's official song.^[13]

Official Sponsors

• Emirates
• Epson^[14]
• ING Group^[15]
• JCB Co., Ltd.
• Konica Minolta
• Maxell
• Samsung
• The Asahi Shimbun
• Toshiba^[16]
• Yamaha Motor Company^[17]

Official Supporters

• FamilyMart
• Hyundai Heavy Industries
• Kirin Company
• Makita
• Nike, Inc.
• Nikon

• Sports diplomacy

• AFC Asian Cup 2007 Official Site (Archived)
• Asian Cup 2007 at RSSSF