The Chinese, who reached the final in 2004 before losing to Japan, have had a disappointing build-up to the tournament with Zhu's team branded too defensive to be capable of sustaining a challenge for the trophy.

The former Shenzhen Jianlibao coach, however, is biding his time over his final selection but believes his team will be in a position to launch a challenge by the time of their opening match against Malaysia on July 10.

"I have not finalised my plans ahead of the Asian Cup as some players I am looking at are carrying injuries," he said.

"We have another match coming up this week against Melbourne Victory before we go to Malaysia.

"We got together on June 22 and since then we have been practising together and I am happy with the progress the team has made and we will be ready for the Asian Cup when we fly to Malaysia on June 5."

Zhu's preparations continued on Sunday in Hong Kong where he was handed the opportunity to give the majority of his squad a run-out against a FIFA World XI as part of Hong Kong's celebrations to mark the territory's 10th anniversary of its reunification with China.

The first half saw six players from Hong Kong join five of their counterparts from China and at the break the combined team led 1-0 thanks to a fine long-range strike from Zhao Xuri.

It was all change in the second half as Zhu introduced a full-strength China team, which played out the final 45 minutes and doubled their advantage thanks to another goal from distance, this time from Energie Cottbus midfielder Shao Jiayi.

China, who are drawn in Group C in Kuala Lumpur alongside Iran, Uzbekistan and co-hosts Malaysia, are just one of three teams from east Asia hoping to lift the trophy and Zhu believes his team should be good enough to progress to the knockout phase.

"Japan and China are both strong teams and have a very good chance at the Asian Cup, along with Korea as far as East Asian teams are concerned," he said.

"We have been drawn in Group D and every team has an equal chance to qualify for the knockout stage. But I'm confident we can go through."