KUALA LUMPUR/ZURICH: The Asian Football Confederation and FIFA have agreed on proposed match dates for the remaining qualifying matches of round two in the 2022 World Cup and 2023 Asian Cup.

These were postponed from March and June because of the coronavirus pandemic.

A statement said:

Match Days 7 and 8 are now scheduled to take place on October 8 and 13, 2020 respectively while Match Days 9 and 10 are due to kick off on November 12 and 17, 2020.

The latest decision has been taken with a view to completing the Preliminary Joint Qualification Round 2 by November 2020 and to commence the subsequent FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022 Asian Qualifiers Final Round as well as the play-off matches for the AFC Asian Cup China 2023 Round 3 Qualifiers by the March 2021 match dates in the FIFA International Calendar.

The AFC will continue to monitor the situation closely to ensure the safety and wellbeing of all teams, officials, fans and stakeholders as well as Government travel and medical restrictions and will notify all parties should there be a need to reassess the match schedules due to the ever-evolving impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.

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