Sport - Football   

AFC postpones Olympic qualifier

CHENNAI April 1. The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) has postponed the Athens 2004 Olympic first round qualifier between Iraq and Vietnam scheduled to be held on April 5, owing to the Iraq war.

The match was supposed to be played in neighbouring Syria at Al-Abbasiyin Stadium in Damascus with the return leg at Hanoi Stadium in Vietnam on April 19th.

AFC General Secretary Dato' Peter Velappan said that the AFC decided to postpone the match after consulting with FIFA. ``The Iraqi Football Association (FA) proposed for its match to be played in Damascus in view of the current war situation and we thank the Syrian FA for making all the arrangements to host the match on April 5'', said Mr. Velappan.

However, the AFC has not been able to make any contact with the Iraqi FA for the last two weeks and therefore, was unable to confirm whether Iraq would honour its commitment to play the match on April 5 in Damascus, according to Mr. Velappan. ``The AFC will monitor the current crisis in Iraq and decide when these matches can be played. We hope that the war will come to an end soon and football can be played as usual,'' he stressed.

A total of 36 teams are playing in the two round qualifying competition with the final qualifying round scheduled to be held in August. In the final round, 12 teams will do battle for the coveted three spots in the Athens 2004 Olympics.

FIFA World Cup 2002 semifinalist Korea Republic and Japan are among the 12 seeded teams that qualify automatically for the final qualifying round in this U-23 tournament.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Sport

News: Front Page | National | Southern States | Other States | International | Opinion | Business | Sport | Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary |

Stories in this Section

Chess

• Titles for Ganguly, Arthie confirmed
  
  Cricket
  
• With seniors seeking a break, selectors have a job on hand
• Lara back at the helm
• Elite-C, Plate-A teams
• England players furious over Zimbabwe tour plans
• Boucher dropped as vice-captain
• South Africa to go ahead with Bangladesh tour
  
  Football
  
• TFA halts SBT's winning streak
• England takes on Turkey
• AFC postpones Olympic qualifier
• Titanium drubs Manipur Police
  
  Hockey
  
• IOC meets BSF in final
  
  Tennis
  
• Archana shocks Manisha
• Humidity will be to India's advantage: Paes
  
  Shooting
  
• Abhinav wins a gold in Munich
  
  

Copyright © 2003, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu