The 2013 U-22 Asian Football Championship (officially: AFC U-22 Championship 2013 A1 ) was the first edition of the tournament and was held in Oman from January 11 to 26, 2014 . The West Asian country prevailed against Thailand in the award of the tournament and is thus the host of the first edition of the tournament, which will also serve as a qualification for the Summer Olympic Games in the future .
Of the 46 member associations of the AFC, 41 registered to take part. The teams were divided according to their geographical location into the West Group, consisting of West, Central and South Asia, and the East Group, consisting of Southeast and East Asia and Australia. During the draw, the teams were divided into seven groups of six teams each and one group of five teams.
The qualification was played out in June and July 2012, the two group winners qualified. In addition, the best third group from the western and eastern groups came.
The competition consisted of a qualifying round played in the championship mode with home and away legs and the final round played in a group phase and the finals.
In the final round, the sixteen participants formed four preliminary round groups with four teams each, of which the first two qualified for the quarter-finals. In the group stage, each team played against every other team in its group according to the championship mode, with three points being awarded for a win and one point for a draw. If several teams were tied in the group games, first the goal difference, then the number of goals scored from the direct encounters, decided on the placement. Then the goal difference and the number of goals scored in all group matches were used.
From the quarter-finals, the tournament continued in the semi-finals and finals in the knockout system , with the winner of a game qualifying for the next round. If a game ended in a draw after normal playing time, it was extended by 15 minutes twice. If no decision was made after extra time, the winner of the match was determined on penalties.
A1The tournament was originally scheduled to run from June 23 to July 3, 2013, but was then postponed. The designation AFC U-22 Championship 2013 was retained, however, cf. AFC U-22 Championship 2013 Match Schedule ( March 1, 2014 memento on WebCite ), accessed January 6, 2014
A2Originally, the Omani team was qualified as the best group third from the West Asian group. Since Oman was automatically qualified as host later, Yemen moved up.