The West Asian Football Federation (WAFF) approved the seedlings for the upcoming tournament of the seventh West Asian Championship men football competition 2012, on four levels.
The seeding of the participating teams in the tournament at different levels is based on the FIFA Ranking which was released on Wednesday , September 5th. The first level comprises of Kuwait, the host team and defending champions along with Iran , the highest ranking team in the competition , and Iraq, who obtained the next best ranking the West Asia region of the FIFA Ranking.
The distribution of teams at different levels as follows:
Level 1: Kuwait, Iran, Iraq,
Level 2 : Jordan, Oman, Saudi Arabia
Level 3: Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates, Lebanon
Level 4: Syria, Palestine, Yemen.
The West Asian Football Federation (WAFF) announced earlier the date of the draw to be on the 16th September in Kuwait City. The 7th Tournament will consist of 3 groups of 4 teams each, Winners of each group will shall qualify for the semi-finals along with the best team finishing second in the 3 groups.
For the best second team , the system adopted to determine such team (the best team in second place) will consider total number of points achieved by each team in the group matches, then goal difference in the group matches , the number of goals scored and the number of yellow and red cards least obtained by each team. In the unlikely event of continuing tie between two or more teams , the selection of such team will be determined by a draw.
The tournament will be held in Kuwait during the period from 8 to 20 December 2012 in Kuwait, with the participation of 12 teams : Kuwait, Jordan, UAE, Iran, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Iraq, Oman, Palestine, Lebanon and Yemen.
The sixth edition of the tournament was held in 2010 in Jordan, where the Kuwaiti team crowned champions after beating Iran 2-1 in the final.
FIFA ranking for the current month put the participating teams tournament as follows: 54 – Iran: 573 points, 78 – Iraq: 437 points, 87 – Jordan: 402 points, 93 – Oman: 376 points, 100 – Kuwait: 348 points .105 – Saudi Arabia: 328 points, 112 – Bahrain: 308 points, 120 – UAE: 278 points, 124 – Lebanon: 271 points, 148 – Syria: 170 points, 151 – Palestine: 161 points, 152 – Yemen: 154 points.