COVID-19 again postpones Jordan's Asian football qualifiers

AMMAN — Jordan's remaining 2022 FIFA World Cup and 2023 Asian Cup qualifiers have been arranged to be played in June after the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) shifted some qualifiers dates due to health concerns.

Travel and quarantine restrictions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic have been cited as the reasons for the joint agreement AFC-FIFA agreement to move the fixtures that had been scheduled to be held from March 25 to 30.

Jordan's match against Kuwait was thus postponed to be played in June as the AFC said it was looking to adopt a centralised approach to the rescheduled matches and is encouraging member associations to put forward cases to host them.

"The AFC continues to place the health and safety of players, teams, match officials and all stakeholders as the highest priority and will work together with its member associations to closely monitor the situation in the region," a statement from the AFC read.

The AFC’s qualification process has been halted since November 2019 as the COVID-19 pandemic heavily impacted the organisation’s tournaments.

The third round of World Cup qualification is set for September. The top four teams in the third round will join tournament hosts Qatar at the World Cup, while a further place could be secured by an Asian team via the intercontinental play-off.

Meanwhile, in latest FIFA Rankings, Jordan stayed in the 95th spot overall and 15th in Asia lagging behind relatively uncompetitive Asian teams compared to their best ranking of 37th in 2004.

Jordan recently held a training camp in Dubai where they played a series of matches. They lost 2-0 to world's 85th ranked Uzbekistan 2-0, beat 121st ranked Tajikistan 2-0 before losing 1-0 in the second encounter. They also lost 1-0 to Russia's Premier league leaders FC Zenit Saint Petersburg, and held Ukraine's FC Dynamo Kyiv 0-0. During the camp in Dubai, national team captain and goalie Amer Shafie announced his retirement. 

The Asian qualifiers were halted last year amid the COVID-19 pandemic after teams played five matches. Australia currently lead Group B, and Jordan shares second spot with matches remaining against Kuwait, Nepal and Australia. The top team from each of the eight competing groups and four best second place finishers will move to the 2023 Asian Cup finals and Round 3 of World Cup qualifiers. So far, Jordan beat Taiwan 5-0 and 2-1, lost 1-0 to Australia, held Kuwait 0-0 and beat Nepal 3-0.

Looking back at the Jordan's peak performance, in 2013, the team was on the verge of qualifying to the 2014 World Cup for the first time and advanced to play then World's 6th ranked Uruguay in an intercontinental qualifying tie. The Kingdom had never reached that far in World Cup qualifying since first taking part in qualifiers. Round 3 had been the furthest Jordan reached in the past seven times since 1986 qualifiers.

In Asia, Jordan reached the Round of 16 in the last edition of the Asian Cup. Since first taking part in Asian Cup qualifiers in 1972, Jordan reached the Asian Cup four times: the highlight was at the 13th Asian Cup in 2004, when they lost to Japan in the quarterfinals and jumped to the best ever FIFA rank of 37th. They also reached the Asian Cup in 2011 and 2015 and 2019. 

Regionally, Jordan finished runner up to Bahrain at the 9th West Asian Championship in 2019. It was the fourth time for Jordan in the final after 2002, 2008 and 2014.  Iran won the title for the fourth time in 2008. Iraq won the title once in 2002, Kuwait in 2010, Syria in 2012 and Qatar in 2014 and Bahrain in 2019.