2014 FIFA World Cup qualification (AFC)

Format

The main qualifying draw took place in Brazil on 30 July 2011. Initially it was announced that the AFC Competitions Committee decided to use the 2010 qualification format for the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil. The AFC published information in their calendar suggesting qualifiers would start on 8 October 2010 with the first leg of first round ties.

Therefore, for the 2010 finals, FIFA advised the AFC that 2014 qualifiers could not begin until after mid-2011. On 13 August 2010 the AFC announced a format for the qualifiers that was identical to the 2010 format even though the final number of qualifiers had not been determined. A final format, with the initial stages modified slightly from 2010, was announced in March 2011.

Qualification began with two sets of two-leg knock-out qualification rounds – the first held on 29 June and 2 July and 3 July 2011 and the second on 23 and 28 July – reducing the number of teams in the main draw to 20. As in the 2010 format, the third stage consisted of 5 groups of 4 teams (with matches held between September 2011 and February 2012) with the top 2 in each group advancing to 2 groups of 5 that will play a further group stage during 2012 and 2013. The top two teams in each group qualify for the 2014 finals directly, with the two third-placed teams playing-off for a chance to qualify via an intercontinental qualifying tie. A random draw determined that the final tie would be against the fifth-placed team from CONMEBOL qualification.

Entrants

43 of the 46 AFC national teams entered qualification. A ranking list for the qualification rounds was released by AFC on 8 March 2011, with an updated list released due to the non-participation of Guam and Bhutan.

The rankings determined the round of qualification that teams began competition:

First round

The first round consisted of eight home-and-away series, featuring the 16 lowest ranked teams in Asia. The winners of these series proceeded to the second round.

Seeding

Teams were seeded into two pots – Pot 1 included teams ranked 28–35 and Pot 2 teams ranked 36–43.

Matches

The first round draw of the Asian qualifiers took place on 30 March 2011 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The first legs were played on 29 June 2011 and the second legs were played on 2 and 3 July 2011.

Second round

The second round consisted of fifteen home-and-away series, featuring the 8 winners from the first round and other 22 teams ranked 6–27. The winners of these series then proceeded to the third round.

Seeding

Teams were seeded into two pots – Pot 1 included teams ranked 6–20 and Pot 2 teams ranked 21–27 along with the 8 first round winners.

^† First round winners whose identity was not known at the time of the draw.

Matches

Ties were drawn at the same time as the first round. The first legs were played on 23 July 2011 and the second legs were played on 28 July 2011.

Third round

The third round saw the 5 automatic qualifiers joined by the 15 winners from the second round. These teams were drawn into five groups of four teams, at the World Cup Preliminary Draw at the Marina da Glória in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil on 30 July 2011. The matches were played from 2 September 2011 to 29 February 2012. The top two teams from each group advanced to the fourth round.

Seeding

The July 2011 FIFA Ranking – released on 27 July – was used to seed the teams. (Rankings shown in brackets)

Note. Syria were replaced by Tajikistan in the third round on 19 August 2011 following the awarding of both second round matches to Tajikistan.

Fourth round

The fourth round saw the group winners and runners-up from the third round play in two groups of five. The top two teams from each group advanced to the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, while the two third-placed teams advance to the fifth round. Japan, South Korea, Australia and Iran have qualified for the 2014 FIFA World Cup.

Seeding

The draw for Round Four was held on 9 March 2012 in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, with the teams seeded according to their March 2012 FIFA Ranking. The FIFA rankings used were released on 7 March 2012 and included all matches from the third round of Asian Qualifiers for the 2014 FIFA World Cup. The ten teams (shown below with their March 2012 FIFA Ranking in brackets) are split into five pots, with each group containing a team from each pot.

Groups

The matches were played from 3 June 2012 to 18 June 2013.

As the competition partially overlapped with the 2013 FIFA Confederations Cup, which was held from 15 June 2013, the AFC decided that the match day will be adjusted for Japan, the representative of AFC for the Confederations Cup, placing them on Position 5 in their group in order not to play on 18 June 2013.

Fifth round

The two teams who finished third in the fourth round groups (Jordan and Uzbekistan) played each other to determine the AFC participant in the intercontinental play-off.

The draw for the fifth round of the AFC qualifiers was held in Zürich on 19 March 2013 during meetings of the Organising Committee for the FIFA World Cup. The games took place on 6 and 10 September 2013. With the two teams still evenly matched at full-time in the second leg, Jordan eventually progressed to the intercontinental playoff after winning 9–8 on penalties.

Intercontinental play-off

The fifth round winner, Jordan, played against CONMEBOL's fifth-placed team, Uruguay, in a home-and-away play-off. The winner of this play-off, Uruguay, qualified for the 2014 FIFA World Cup finals.

The first leg was played on 13 November 2013, and the second leg was played on 20 November 2013.

Goalscorers

There were 429 goals scored in 150 games, for an average of 2.86 goals per game.