A total of forty teams were drawn into eight groups of five to play home-and-away round-robin matches. They included the 34 teams (teams ranked 1–34 in the AFC entrant list) which received byes to this round, and the six winners from the first round.
Seven group winners (excluding Qatar, who had already qualified to the World Cup as tournament hosts) and the five best runners-up advanced to the third round.
Matches in this round were also part of the 2023 AFC Asian Cup qualifying campaign. [4] The twelve teams which advanced to the third round of the FIFA World Cup qualification and Qatar, as group winners, automatically qualified for the 2023 AFC Asian Cup. [5] Twenty-four teams (22 of which advanced directly and two which advanced from an additional play-off round) [6] played in the third round of the AFC Asian Cup qualification to decide the remaining eleven teams. In total, the 2023 AFC Asian Cup featured 24 teams.
Schedule
The schedule of each matchday was as follows.
On 5 March 2020, FIFA announced that it would be monitoring the health situation in the region for possible rescheduling of matchdays 7 through 10 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. [9] Later on 9 March, FIFA and AFC jointly announced that the matches on matchdays 7–10 due to take place in March and June 2020 were postponed, with the new dates to be confirmed. However, subject to approval by FIFA and AFC, and agreement of both member associations, the matches may be played as scheduled provided that all individuals' safety meets the required standards. [10] [11] On 5 June, AFC confirmed that matchdays 7 and 8 were scheduled to take place on 8 and 13 October respectively while matchdays 9 and 10 were scheduled to kick off on 12 and 17 November. [12] On 12 August, FIFA announced that the matches scheduled for October and November 2020 would be rescheduled to 2021. [13] [14]
On 11 November 2020, the AFC Competitions Committee agreed at its third meeting that all second-round matches should be completed by 15 June 2021 with matchdays 7 and 8 in March and 9 and 10 in June. [3] On the same day, however, FIFA, along with the Bangladeshi and Qatari associations, approved the only second-round match originally scheduled for 2020, Qatar versus Bangladesh, which was played on 4 December. [15]
On 19 February 2021, FIFA and AFC postponed most of the upcoming matches to June. [16]
Note: The group spots of Qatar and Bangladesh were swapped due to Qatar's planned participation in the 2020 Copa América, which was later deferred (becoming the 2021 Copa América). Qatar eventually withdrew.
| Matchday | Date(s) |
|---|
| Matchday 1 | 5 September 2019 |
| Matchday 2 | 10 September 2019 |
| Matchday 3 | 10 October 2019 |
| Matchday 4 | 15 October 2019 |
| Matchday 5 | 14 November 2019 |
| Matchday 6 | 19 November 2019 |
| Matchday 7 | 25 March, 28 May and 3 June 2021 |
| Matchday 8 | 4 December 2020, 30 March and 7 & 9 June 2021 |
| Matchday 9 | 30 March, 30 May and 11 June 2021 |
| Matchday 10 | 13 and 15 June 2021 |
Original group stage schedule| Matchday | Date |
|---|
| Matchday 7 | 26 March 2020, later 8 October |
| Matchday 8 | 31 March 2020, later 13 October |
| Matchday 9 | 4 June 2020, later 12 November, then 7 June 2021 |
| Matchday 10 | 9 June 2020, later 17 November |
Centralised venues
On 12 March 2021, AFC confirmed the hosts for the group stage scheduled to take place from 31 May to 15 June. [17]
- Group A: United Arab Emirates (China hosted Guam on 28 May.)
- Group B: Kuwait
- Group C: Bahrain
- Group D: Saudi Arabia
- Group E: Qatar
- Group F: Japan
- Group G: United Arab Emirates
- Group H: South Korea
In general, these hosts were the seeded (Pot 1) teams from each group. The exceptions were Group A (where United Arab Emirates took over hosting duties after China could not host due to COVID-19 restrictions), Group B (where Pot 4 team Kuwait hosted rather than Australia), and Group C (where Pot 3 team Bahrain hosted rather than Iran).
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Ali Mabkhout 
