Tough,but lucky start for Maldives

Maldives to start the campaign against Yemen

Male', MALDIVES - Maldives are drawn into a tough start to their World Cup 2010 qualifying facing Middle East giant Yemen in October in their round one clash. Round one will be played on home and away basis, which will start on October 8th and should be completed by 28th of October.

Among the 19 winners of group one, the best eleven (based on their ranking) will advance to the round three and the rest will head to round two.

Best five seeded teams will launch their qualifying campaign from round three and they are; Australia, South Korea, Saudi Arabia, Japan and Iran.

Maldives is seeded at 27th of the 43 teams and Yemen lies at 24.

Meanwhile from the SAARC region, Pakistan will face a tough battle against newly crowned Asian champions Iraq. 30th seed Sri Lanka will face 16th seed Qatar; Bhutan will face Kuwait, Bangladesh against Tajikistan, Nepal to meet Oman and 28th seed India to travel to 16th seed Lebanon.

Based on the seeding Maldives is said to be the luckiest in the SAARC region to face an opponent three seeds ahead of them.

AFC put teams seeded from 6 - 24 in pot A and the rest in pot B for the draw of round one and in this round a pot A team will face a team from pot B, meaning teams seeded from 25 - 43.

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