The 2014 AFC Cup was the 11th edition of the

AFC Cup The AFC Cup is an annual continental club football competition organised by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). Under its current rules, the competition is played primarily between clubs from nations that did not receive direct qualifying s ...

, a

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

competition organized by the

Asian Football Confederation The Asian Football Confederation is the governing body of association football, beach soccer, and futsal in some countries/territories in Asia and Oceania. It has 47 member countries most of which are located in Asia. Australia, formerly in ...

(AFC) for clubs from "developing countries" in Asia. Al-Kuwait were the two-time defending champions, but were eliminated by

Persipura Jayapura Persatuan Sepakbola Indonesia Jayapura, or Persipura, is an Indonesian football club based in Jayapura, Papua. The club was founded in 1963 and currently competes in the Liga 2. Persipura used to always use the Mandala Stadium as their hom ...

in the quarter-finals. In the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which decides a winner for an event ** Another term for playoffs, describing a sequence of cont ...

Al-Qadsia Al-Qadsiah Football Club ( ar, نادي القادسية) is a Saudi Arabian professional football club that competes in the Saudi First Division League. They are based in Khobar and their home ground is the Prince Saud bin Jalawi Stadium. His ...

of Kuwait defeated

Erbil Erbil, also called Hawler (, ar, أربيل, Arbīl; syr, ܐܲܪܒܹܝܠ, Arbel), is the capital and most populated city in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. It lies in the Erbil Governorate. It has an estimated population of around 1,600,000. Hu ...

of Iraq 4–2 on penalties after a 0–0 draw, to win their first AFC Cup title after losing in the previous year's final.

Allocation of entries per association

The AFC laid out the procedure for deciding the participating associations and the allocation of slots, with the final decision to be made by the AFC on 26 November 2013. The following changes to the list of participating associations may be made from the

2013 AFC Cup The 2013 AFC Cup was the tenth edition of the AFC Cup, a football competition organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) for clubs from "developing countries" in Asia. In an all-Kuwait final, defending champions Al-Kuwait defeated Al-Q ...

if the AFC approves the following applications made by any association: *An association originally participating in the AFC Cup may apply to participate in the

2014 AFC Champions League The 2014 AFC Champions League was the 33rd edition of the top-level Asian club football tournament organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), and the 12th under the current AFC Champions League title. Guangzhou Evergrande were the defe ...

. An association may participate in both the AFC Champions League and the AFC Cup if it only partially fulfills the AFC Champions League criteria. *An association originally participating in the

AFC President's Cup The AFC President's Cup was an annual international association football competition between domestic clubs sides run by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) held between 2005 and 2014. The competition targeted emerging football nations, and wa ...

may apply to participate in the 2014 AFC Cup. The following changes in the participating associations were made compared to the previous year: *

Kyrgyzstan Kyrgyzstan,, pronounced or the Kyrgyz Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Asia. Kyrgyzstan is bordered by Kazakhstan to the north, Uzbekistan to the west, Tajikistan to the south, and the People's Republic of China to the east. ...

and

Palestine __NOTOC__ Palestine may refer to: * State of Palestine, a state in Western Asia * Palestine (region), a geographic region in Western Asia * Palestinian territories, territories occupied by Israel since 1967, namely the West Bank (including East ...

clubs' participation were upgraded from the AFC President's Cup to the AFC Cup starting from 2014 by the AFC. Each participating association was given either two entries to the group stage or one entry to the qualifying play-off, based on the AFC Technical Ranking and the number of associations in each zone.

Teams

The following teams entered the competition. Teams in ''italics'' played in the

2014 AFC Champions League qualifying play-off The qualifying play-off of the 2014 AFC Champions League was played from 29 January to 15 February 2014, to decide four of the 32 places in the group stage. Format The bracket for the qualifying play-off was determined by the AFC based on the assoc ...

, but failed to advance to the AFC Champions League group stage (had they advanced to the AFC Champions League group stage, they would have been replaced by another team from the same association). ;Notes

Schedule

The schedule of the competition was as follows (all draws held at AFC headquarters in

Kuala Lumpur , anthem = '' Maju dan Sejahtera'' , image_map = , map_caption = , pushpin_map = Malaysia#Southeast Asia#Asia , pushpin_map_caption = , coordinates = , su ...

Malaysia Malaysia ( ; ) is a country in Southeast Asia. The federation, federal constitutional monarchy consists of States and federal territories of Malaysia, thirteen states and three federal territories, separated by the South China Sea into two r ...

Qualifying play-off

The bracket for the qualifying play-off was determined by the AFC. Each tie was played as a single match.

Extra time Overtime or extra time is an additional period of play specified under the rules of a sport to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played onl ...

and

penalty shoot-out The penalty shootout is a method of determining a winner in sports matches that would have otherwise been drawn or tied. The rules for penalty shootouts vary between sports and even different competitions; however, the usual form is similar to pen ...

were used to decide the winner if necessary. The winners of each tie advanced to the

group stage A tournament is a competition involving at least three competitors, all participating in a sport or game. More specifically, the term may be used in either of two overlapping senses: # One or more competitions held at a single venue and concent ...

to join the 30 automatic qualifiers.

Group stage

The draw for the group stage was held on 10 December 2013. The 32 teams were drawn into eight groups of four. Teams from the same association could not be drawn into the same group. Each group was played on a home-and-away round-robin basis. The winners and runners-up of each group advanced to the

round of 16 A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...

. ;Tiebreakers The teams are ranked according to

points Point or points may refer to: Places * Point, Lewis, a peninsula in the Outer Hebrides, Scotland * Point, Texas, a city in Rains County, Texas, United States * Point, the NE tip and a ferry terminal of Lismore, Inner Hebrides, Scotland * Point ...

(3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss). If tied on points, tiebreakers are applied in the following order: #Greater number of points obtained in the group matches between the teams concerned #

Goal difference Goal difference, goal differential or points difference is a form of tiebreaker used to rank sport teams which finish on equal points in a league competition. Either "goal difference" or "points difference" is used, depending on whether matches ar ...

resulting from the group matches between the teams concerned #Greater number of goals scored in the group matches between the teams concerned (

away goals The away goals rule is a method of tiebreaking in association football and other sports when teams play each other twice, once at each team's home ground. Under the away goals rule, if the total goals scored by each team are equal, the team that ...

do not apply) #Goal difference in all the group matches #Greater number of goals scored in all the group matches #

Penalty shoot-out The penalty shootout is a method of determining a winner in sports matches that would have otherwise been drawn or tied. The rules for penalty shootouts vary between sports and even different competitions; however, the usual form is similar to pen ...

if only two teams are involved and they are both on the field of play #Fewer score calculated according to the number of yellow and red cards received in the group matches (1 point for a single yellow card, 3 points for a red card as a consequence of two yellow cards, 3 points for a direct red card, 4 points for a yellow card followed by a direct red card) #Drawing of lots

Group A

Group B

Group C

;

Tiebreakers In games and sports, a tiebreaker or tiebreak is used to determine a winner from among players or teams that are tied at the end of a contest, or a set of contests. General operation In matches In some situations, the tiebreaker may consi ...

*Al-Qadsia and Al-Hidd are ranked on head-to-head record.

Group D

Group E

;

*Churchill Brothers and Home United are ranked on head-to-head record.

Group F

Group G

Group H

;

*Tampines Rovers and Pune are ranked on head-to-head record.

Knock-out stage

In the knock-out stage, the 16 teams played a

single-elimination tournament A single-elimination, knockout, or sudden death tournament is a type of elimination tournament where the loser of each match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final matc ...

. In the quarter-finals and semi-finals, each tie was played on a home-and-away

two-legged In sports (particularly association football), a two-legged tie is a contest between two teams which comprises two matches or "legs", with each team as the home team in one leg. The winning team is usually determined by aggregate score, the sum o ...

basis, while in the round of 16 and final, each tie was played as a single match. The

away goals rule The away goals rule is a method of tiebreaker, tiebreaking in association football and other sports when teams play each other twice, once at each team's home ground. Under the away goals rule, if the total goals scored by each team are equal, the ...

(for two-legged ties),

extra time Overtime or extra time is an additional period of play specified under the rules of a sport to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played onl ...

(away goals do not apply in extra time) and

were used to decide the winner if necessary.

Bracket

Round of 16

In the round of 16, the winners of one group played the runners-up of another group in the same zone, with the group winners hosting the match. , - !colspan=3, West Asia Zone , - !colspan=3, East Asia Zone

Quarter-finals

The draw for the quarter-finals was held on 28 May 2014. Teams from different zones could be drawn into the same tie, and the "country protection" rule was applied, so teams from the same association could not be drawn into the same tie.

Semi-finals

Final

The draw to decide the host team of the final was held after the quarter-final draw.

Awards

Top scorers

References

External links

AFC Cup
the-AFC.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Afc Cup 2014 2

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