BEACH SOCCER – Bahrain's beach soccer national team will be taking part in the 11th AFC Beach Soccer Asian Cup next year.
The tournament, organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), is set to be hosted by Thailand. The Bahrainis are one of 16 teams set to be in action at Jomtien Beach in Pattaya from March 20 to 30, 2025.
The other participating nations include defending champions Iran, Japan, Oman, the UAE, Kuwait, China, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Malaysia, Indonesia, India, Iraq, Vietnam, and hosts Thailand.
The field will be split into four groups at the draw, which is scheduled to take place on Thursday at the AFC House in Kuala Lumpur.
They have been seeded into four pots, based on their final ranking from the 2023 tournament where applicable, with Thailand seeded first as the host association. The Bahrainis have been placed in pot two for the draw, along with the UAE, Kuwait, and China.
In the continental competition, the top two finishers from each group move into the knockouts. At the end of the tournament, the three teams to medal will earn qualification to the Fifa Beach Soccer World Cup 2025, to be held in the Seychelles.
Bahrain have won the AFC Beach Soccer Asian Cup once in the past – in the inaugural event in 2006, held in the UAE. They had also claimed the silver medals in the 2009 edition.
The nationals qualified for the Fifa Beach Soccer World Cup both times. They made it through to the quarter-finals in the 2006 event in Brazil where they were classified sixth overall, but then in 2009 in the UAE did not advance past the first round, en route to finishing 16th overall.
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