(CNN Philippines) — The draw seedings of the Philippines and 39 other countries who will compete in the preliminary joint qualification round two for the 2018 FIFA World Cup and the 2019 AFC Asian Cup UAE Qualifiers have been announced according to the official website of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC).
Based on the latest FIFA world rankings released on Thursday (April 9), the teams were divided into five pots, from which, they will be drawn into eight groups consisting of five teams on Tuesday (April 14).
• Pot 1 (Teams ranked 1st to 8th): Iran, Japan, Korea Republic, Australia, UAE, Uzbekistan, China, Iraq
• Pot 2 (Teams ranked 9th to 16th): Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Jordan, Bahrain, Vietnam, Syria and Kuwait
• Pot 3 (Teams ranked 17th to 24th): Afghanistan, Philippines, Palestine, Maldives, Thailand, Tajikistan, Lebanon and India
• Pot 4 (Teams ranked 25th to 32nd): Timor-Leste, Kyrgyzstan, DPR Korea, Myanmar, Turkmenistan, Indonesia, Singapore and Bhutan
• Pot 5 (Teams ranked 33rd to 40th): Malaysia, Hong Kong, Bangladesh, Yemen, Guam, Laos, Cambodia and Chinese Taipei
The April 14th draw marks the first time wherein the AFC merged the qualification process of the FIFA World Cup and the AFC Asian Cup.
Countries that are grouped in the same pot won’t be playing each other in the qualification rounds. Teams will be competing in a double-round robin format from June 11 up until March 29 of next year.
The top 12 teams will advance to the final round of the World Cup Qualifiers and automatically make the 2019 Asian Cup finals.
