Australia, Japan top seeds for 2011 Asian Cup draw

Reuters - Australia and Japan will be the top seeds in this month's draw for the 2011 Asian Cup qualifiers, the Asian Football Confederation said on Thursday.

Both teams had disappointing campaigns at this year's finals and therefore must enter the qualifying competition along with three-times winners Iran and former World Cup qualifiers China.

They all missed out on automatic qualification for the 2011 finals which goes to Asian Cup hosts Qatar, 2007 winners Iraq, runners-up Saudi Arabia and third-placed team South Korea.

The first round of qualifying matches will put teams ranked 20-27 into pairs for a home and away qualifier.

The winners of each pairing will advance to round two, where they will be joined by the 16 teams seeded 4-19 and split into five groups of four.

The top two in each group will go through to the 2011 tournament where they will join the automatic qualifiers -- Qatar, Iraq, Saudi Arabia and South Korea.

In addition, the winners of the 2008 and 2010 Challenge Cup tournament -- contested by Asia's lowest-ranked nations -- will also go through to the 2011 finals.

The draw will take place on Dec. 17 in Kuala Lumpur.

Seedings: 1. Iraq; 2. Saudi Arabia; 3. South Korea; 4. Japan; 5. Australia; 6. Iran; 7. Uzbekistan; 8. Vietnam; 9. China ; 10. Thailand; 11. Indonesia; 12. UAE; 13. Bahrain; 14. Oman; 15. Malaysia; 16. Jordan; 17. Syria; 18. Hong Kong; 19. Yemen; 20. Kuwait; 21. Singapore; 22. India; 23. Lebanon; 24. North Korea; 25. Myanmar; 26. Maldives; 27. Turkmenistan.