Only four spots remain up for grabs for the AFC Asian Cup Saudi Arabia 2027 after Singapore came back from a goal down to beat Hong Kong 2-1 in their Qualifiers Final Round match.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With the win Singapore confirmed their qualification from Group C. An early goal from Matt Orr was cancelled out by Shawal Anuar and Ilhan Fandi in the second half to take Singapore to 11 points, earning them qualification to the Finals on merit for the first time, with their only previous appearance being as hosts of the 1984 edition.
It was heartbreak for Hong Kong, China, who were seeking back-to-back appearances at the Finals after having ended a 55-year wait by qualifying for Qatar 2023. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Backed by their fans at the Kai Tak Stadium, Hong Kong, China were quick to settle and took the lead in the 15th minute when captain Orr collected a cross from Everton Camargo and placed the ball beyond keeper Izwan Mahbud.
Both sides had equal opportunities in front of goal but failed to capitalise on any openings, leaving Hong Kong, China, hanging on to their slender lead at the end of the first half. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Singapore came out energised after the break, and Shawal found the equaliser in the 64th minute when he latched on to a pass from Ilhan and chipped over Wang Zhenpeng.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ilhan, who had come on in the 57th minute, put Singapore ahead 11 minutes later after he smashed the ball past the Hong Kong, China keeper from the edge of the area.
A buoyant Singapore conclude their qualifying campaign against Bangladesh while Hong Kong, China will play India, with both ties on March 31.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Meanwhile, Syria cruised to a 5-0 win over Pakistan in Group E to maintain their perfect record.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The win sees the West Asian side, who already qualified, with two rounds to spare, move up to 15 points with Pakistan rooted at the bottom. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Malaysia, embroiled in fielding illegal players in their previous matches against Vietnam and Nepal. had to work hard before edging Nepal 1-0 in their Group F tie at Bukit Jalil National Stadium.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With Vietnam only playing Laos on Wednesday, Malaysia moved six points clear at the top with the victory.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
RESULTS<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n Group A: <\/strong>Timor-Leste 0-5 Tajikistan; Maldives 0-2 Philippines<\/p>\n\n\n\n Group B: <\/strong>Brunei Darussalam 0-3 Lebanon; Yemen 7-1 Bhutan<\/p>\n\n\n\n Group C: <\/strong>Hong Kong, China 1-2 Singapore; Bangladesh 1-0 India Group F: <\/strong>Nepal 0-1 Malaysia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Only four spots remain up for grabs for the AFC Asian Cup Saudi Arabia 2027 after Singapore came<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6228,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[63],"class_list":["post-6227","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsbeat","tag-football"],"aioseo_notices":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed.jpg",1536,1024,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed-768x512.jpg",640,427,true],"large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed-1024x683.jpg",640,427,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed.jpg",1536,1024,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed.jpg",1536,1024,false],"morenews-large":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed-825x575.jpg",825,575,true],"morenews-medium":["https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed-590x410.jpg",590,410,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"Newsbeat<\/a>","tag_info":"Newsbeat","comment_count":"0","jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/11\/fas_compressed.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6227","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6227"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6227\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6229,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6227\/revisions\/6229"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6227"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6227"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.infinitysport.asia\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6227"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Group D: <\/strong>Sri Lanka 0-4 Thailand; Turkmenistan 3-1 Chinese Taipei
Group E: <\/strong>Pakistan 0-5 Syria<\/p>\n\n\n\n