After South Korea’s withdrawal from their bid to stage Asian Cup Football tournament bid China will now be hosting 2023 AFC Asian Cup. China was the sole other bidder and now has a free run to become hosts.
Key Details
- Background: In 2017, The KFA announced Seoul’s bid to host the 24-nation AFC 2023 edition. It would have been after a gap of 63 years that South korea would have hosted the most prestigious football tournament in Asia. It hosted AFC for the first time in 1960.
- About: South korea’s withdrawal from Asian Cup means that on 4 June 2019 China should be confirmed by Asian Football Confederation as new host of the Asian nations championship finals. Previously, Indonesia and Thailand had expressed interest in hosting AFC 2023 event, but then dropped their bids.
- Earlier: This is the second time China will be hosting the event. It was in 2004 when China staged the tournament lost with 3-1 to Japan in Beijing final.
- Reason: As per the Korea Football Association (KFA) it pulled out of hosting tournament so as to ‘strategically focus’ on a joint bid with North Korea to host Women’s World Cup which will also be held in 2023.
About Women’s World Cup 2023
- Background: The KFA announced the joint bid with North Korea in March 2019.
- For the Women’s World Cup 2023 the South Korean government and Fifa (Fédération Internationale de Football Association) will provide active support so that joint hosting by South and North Koreas can be materialized.
- But after recent North Korea-US nuclear talks deadlocked, the diplomatic contacts between Pyongyang (North Korea Capital) and Seoul (South Korea Capital) have been dwindling.
Note
- The AFC 2019 tournament was 17th edition of AFC Cup was held from 5 January to 1 February 2019.
- It was hosted by United Arab Emirates (UAE). The number of participant team was expanded to 24 nations for the first time from the earlier 16-team format. Qatar won the final with 3-1 against Japan.