AFC Cup 2015
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The 2015 AFC Cup was the 12th edition of the
AFC Cup The AFC Champions League Two (abbreviated as the ACL Two or ACL2) is an annual continental club football competition organised by the Asian Football Confederation. It is the second-tier competition of Asian club football, ranked below the AFC C ...
,
Asia Asia ( , ) is the largest continent in the world by both land area and population. It covers an area of more than 44 million square kilometres, about 30% of Earth's total land area and 8% of Earth's total surface area. The continent, which ...
's secondary club
football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...
tournament organized by the
Asian Football Confederation The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) is the governing body of association football, beach soccer, and futsal in most countries and territories in Asia. The AFC was formed in 1954. It has 47 members. The Asian Ladies Football Confederation ( ...
(AFC).
Johor Darul Ta'zim Johor, also spelled Johore,'' is a state of Malaysia in the south of the Malay Peninsula. It borders with Pahang, Malacca and Negeri Sembilan to the north. Johor has maritime borders with Singapore to the south and Indonesia to the east and w ...
from Malaysia won the tournament after defeating Istiklol from Tajikistan in the
final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final examination or finals, a test given at the end of a course of study or training *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which d ...
. Al-Qadsia, the defending champions, were eliminated in the semi-finals after the
Kuwait Football Association The Kuwait Football Association () is the governing body of association football in Kuwait. Kuwait has thrice been suspended by FIFA for political interference since 2007 and were allowed to participate in the 2011 Asian Cup qualifying campaign ...
was suspended by FIFA.


Association team allocation

The AFC Competitions Committee proposed a revamp of the AFC club competitions on 25 January 2014, which was ratified by the AFC Executive Committee on 16 April 2014. The member associations are ranked based on their national team's and clubs' performance over the last four years in AFC competitions, with the allocation of slots for the 2015 and 2016 editions of the AFC club competitions determined by the 2014 rankings: *The top 24 member associations (MAs) as per the AFC rankings which do not receive direct slots in the AFC Champions League are eligible to participate in the AFC Cup group stage (including losers of the AFC Champions League qualifying play-off). *The MAs ranked 25 to 32 are eligible to participate in the AFC Cup group stage, and the associations ranked 33 to 47 are eligible to participate in the AFC Cup qualifying play-off (including those of "emerging countries" which participated in the
AFC President's Cup The AFC Challenge League (previously known as the AFC President's Cup, abbreviated as ACGL) is an annual third-tier continental club football competition organised by the Asian Football Confederation. The competition is played among clubs from n ...
, whose last edition was in 2014). The AFC Competitions Committee decided on the participation of member associations in the 2015 and 2016 editions of the AFC Cup on 28 November 2014. ;Notes


Teams

The following 41 teams from 23 associations entered the competition. Teams in ''italics'' played in the 2015 AFC Champions League qualifying play-off, 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 were held in
Kuala Lumpur Kuala Lumpur (KL), officially the Federal Territory of Kuala Lumpur, is the capital city and a Federal Territories of Malaysia, federal territory of Malaysia. It is the largest city in the country, covering an area of with a census population ...
,
Malaysia Malaysia is a country in Southeast Asia. Featuring the Tanjung Piai, southernmost point of continental Eurasia, it is a federation, federal constitutional monarchy consisting of States and federal territories of Malaysia, 13 states and thre ...
).


Qualifying play-off

The bracket for the qualifying play-off, which consisted of two rounds (preliminary round and play-off round), was determined by the AFC based on the association ranking of each team. Each tie was played as a single match, with the team from the higher-ranked association hosting the match.
Extra time Overtime (OT) or extra time (ET) is an additional period of play 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 only if the game is required t ...
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 pe ...
were used to decide the winner if necessary. The winners of each tie in the play-off round 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 concentr ...
to join the 27 automatic qualifiers.


Preliminary round

;Notes


Play-off round


Group stage

The draw for the group stage was held on 11 December 2014. 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 a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, w ...
. ;Tiebreakers The teams were ranked according to
points A point is a small dot or the sharp tip of something. Point or points may refer to: Mathematics * Point (geometry), an entity that has a location in space or on a plane, but has no extent; more generally, an element of some abstract topologica ...
(3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss). If tied on points, tiebreakers would be 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; #Greater number of
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 ...
scored in the group matches between the teams concerned; #If, after applying criteria 1 to 4, teams still have an equal ranking, criteria 1 to 4 are reapplied exclusively to the matches between the teams in question to determine their final rankings. If this procedure does not lead to a decision, criteria 6 to 10 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 pe ...
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); #Team who belongs to the member association with the higher AFC ranking.


Group A


Group B


Group C


Group D


Group E


Group F


Group G


Group H


Knockout stage

In the knockout 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 a match-up is immediately eliminated from the tournament. Each winner will play another in the next round, until the final match-up, ...
. In the quarter-finals and semi-finals, each tie was played on a home-and-away two-legged 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 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 ...
(for two-legged ties),
extra time Overtime (OT) or extra time (ET) is an additional period of play 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 only if the game is required t ...
(away goals would not apply in extra time) 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 pe ...
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. ;Notes


Quarter-finals

The draw for the quarter-finals was held on 18 June 2015. Teams from different zones could be drawn into the same tie, and there was no seeding or country protection, so teams from the same association could be drawn into the same tie.


Semi-finals

In the semi-finals, the matchups were determined by the quarter-final draw. ;Notes


Final

In the final, the host team was determined by a draw, held after the quarter-final draw.


Awards


Top scorers


See also

*
2015 AFC Champions League The 2015 AFC Champions League was the 34th edition of Asia's premier club football tournament organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), and the 13th under the current AFC Champions League title. Guangzhou Evergrande won the tourna ...


References


External links


AFC Cup
the-AFC.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Afc Cup 2015 2
2015 2015 was designated by the United Nations as: * International Year of Light * International Year of Soil __TOC__ Events January * January 1 – Lithuania officially adopts the euro as its currency, replacing the litas, and becomes ...
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