BENGALURU: On Thursday, over the span of a few hours, Indian football had its plans for the next year laid out for it. As draws were held for multiple Asian events, India’s men’s, U23 and women’s teams discovered their opponents for the AFC qualifiers for the 2026 World Cup and the upcoming Asian Games respectively.
In the highest-profile of the draws, the senior men’s team was drawn in Group A alongside Qatar, Kuwait and one of Afghanistan and Mongolia in the second round of the Asian qualifiers for the 2026 FIFA World Cup in USA, Mexico and Canada. These matches will also be part of the qualifiers for the 2027 Asian Cup to be held in Saudi Arabia.
The draw represents perhaps the best chance that India has had of reaching the third round of the World Cup qualification process. In the past two qualification campaigns, India found itself in Pot 3 for the draw which meant that the team was always among the weaker teams in the group. In the 2022 qualifiers, for example, India was drawn alongside Qatar and Oman, two stranger opponents against whom it could not hope to progress.
However, a string of good results in the recent Intercontinental Cup and SAFF Cup had propelled the team to eighteenth in Asia and, by extension, Pot 2 for Thursday’s draw. This means that, despite being drawn again alongside the Asian champions Qatar, India can hope to take points against the lesser-ranked Kuwait and Afghanistan/Mongolia.
The Blue Tigers had recently drawn against Kuwait in the SAFF Championships before beating them on penalties in the final. Afghanistan — if they qualify — too will not be unfamiliar opponents for India, having been part of the South Asian Football Federation until 2015. They were in India’s group in the 2022 WC qualifiers as well and held India to two draws.
Even Qatar, much stronger on paper, did not have it easy against India in the 2022 qualifiers. The Blue Tigers managed to hold them 0-0 in the first game before succumbing narrowly to a 0-1 loss in the reverse leg. Finishing second in the group will allow India to be among the 18 teams to progress to the next stage of World Cup qualification and will guarantee them a slot in the 2027 Asian Cup as well. With the 2026 World Cup set to feature an unprecedented 48 teams, eight teams from Asia will qualify directly for the tournament with one more qualifying for the intercontinental playoff.
Chinese test in Asian Games
India’s U23 team, which will participate in the upcoming Asian Games after much speculation, has been drawn alongside hosts China in the group stage. There is, however, hope for the team to progress to knockout rounds with the other two teams in the group — Myanmar and Bangladesh — of comparable quality. The top two teams in all eight groups as well as four top third-placed teams will qualify for the first knockout stage.
The men’s U23 team — three senior players are allowed as well — will be returning to the Asian Games after missing out on the last edition. They finished bottom of their group in 2014 but managed to make it to the round of 16 in 2010 before being defeated by Japan.
The women’s team, ranked 60th in the world, will have a much tougher test, after being drawn alongside two higher-ranked teams in Chinese Taipei and Thailand. Chinese Taipei, ranked 37th in the world, is the strongest team in the group, while Thailand, ranked 44th, comes with a considerable pedigree having played in the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup.