The Asian Football Confederation today revealed its list of rankings for the upcoming qualifying group stages of the World Cup.

It based the seedings on last year's World Cup and performances during the qualifying stages of that.

Luckily for Australia, the AFC ignored recent performances in the Asian Cup...and ranked the Socceroos at the top of the pile.

Teams ranked from one to five get a bye from the first two knockout stages before being entered into the group stage from round three onwards.

The draw for the knockout matches will take place on Monday.

1. Australia
2. Korea Republic
3. Saudi Arabia
4. Japan
5. Iran
6. Bahrain
7. Uzbekistan
8. Kuwait
9. DPR Korea
10. China
11. Jordan
12. Iraq
13. Lebanon
14. Oman
15. UAE
16. Qatar
17. Syria
18. Palestine
19. Thailand
20. Turkmenistan
21. Tajikistan
22. Indonesia
23. Hong Kong
24. Yemen
25. Vietnam
26. Kyrgyzstan
27. Maldives
28. India
29. Singapore
30. Sri Lanka
31. Malaysia
32. Chinese Taipei
33. Bangladesh
34. Macau
35. Pakistan
36. Afghanistan
37. Mongolia
38. Guam
39. Nepal
40. Cambodia
41. Bhutan
42. Myanmar
43. Timor Leste


Teams ranked 6-43 are paired by draw and play one home-and-away knock-out round in October.

Teams ranked from 6-24 will be placed in Pot A and teams ranked from 25-43 will be placed in Pot B.

From 19 teams that progress through this round, the lowest eight based on ranking move to round 2, playing in November, and the other eleven to round 3.

Eight teams are paired by draw and play one home-and-away knock-out round. Four teams progress to round 3.

Eleven qualifiers from round 1 and four qualifiers from round 2 are joined by five highest ranked countries. These 20 teams are split into 5 groups of 4.

First and second in each group qualify to next round.

Games days are:

Match Day 1: 6 Feb 2008

Match Day 2: 26 Mar 2008

Match Day 3: 7 Jun 2008

Match Day 4: 14 Jun 2008

Match Day 5: 6 Sep 2008

Match Day 6: 10 Sep 2008

In round 4, the 10 remaining teams split into two groups of 5 teams
Teams finishing first and second in each group automatically qualify for the World Cup.

Games days for this round are:

Match Day 1: 15 Oct 2008

Match Day 2: 19 Nov 2008

Match Day 3: 11 Feb 2009

Match Day 4: 28 Mar 2009

Match Day 5: 1 Apr 2009

Match Day 6: 6 Jun 2009

Match Day 7: 10 Jun 2009

Match Day 8: 17 Jun 2009

Match Day 9: 5 Sep 2009

Match Day 10: 9 Sep 2009


Teams finishing 3rd in each group from Round 4 play home-and-away playoff on 10 Oct 2009 and 14 Oct 2009.

Finally, the team winning AFC Playoff plays winner of OFC qualification in a home and away playoff for the final World Cup place.

Game days are 14 Nov 2009 and 21 Nov 2009.