Navi Mumbai, Ahmedabad and Bhubaneswar to host AFC Women's Asian Cup 2022

The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) announced the venues for the AFC Women's Asian Cup 2022 on Friday. The DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai, TransStadia in Ahmedabad and Kalinga Stadium in Bhubaneswar have been selected as the three venues for the continental championship.

The Women's Asian Cup will kickstart on January 20 with the final set to be played on February 6 in 2022.

AIFF President and FIFA Council Member Praful Patel said that the selection of venues like Ahmedabad and Bhubaneswar will help in improving the overall football ecosystem in India.

“We are excited to kick off the new year with the AFC Women’s Asian Cup India 2022. Ahmedabad, Bhubaneswar and Navi Mumbai have put in a lot of work to upgrade their footballing infrastructure. While we have seen Navi Mumbai deliver spectacularly in 2017 for the FIFA U-17 World Cup, we are taking the game to new places with Bhubaneswar and Ahmedabad through the two women's tournaments next year, which is really encouraging for our overall football ecosystem."

India to host AFC Asian Women's Cup for the second time

The AFC Asian Women's Cup is the premier women's continental championship for AFC member nations. India had previously hosted the championship in 1980 which was also the first time a Women's Asian Cup was held in South Asia.

After a series of deliberations and recommendations made by the AFC, India won the hosting rights again on June 5, 2020. The other interested parties in hosting the championships were Chinese Taipei and Uzbekistan.

The Indian women's football team has already qualified for the tournament by virtue of being the hosts. Japan, Australia and China have qualified for the tournament by finishing as the champions, runners-up and the third-place winners respectively in the previous edition of the tournament in 2018.

Japan are the defending champions of the AFC Women's Asian Cup.

The qualifiers to select the remaining 8 participating teams will be held from September 13 to 25 in 2021, the draw of which is scheduled on May 27, 2021.

The 2022 AFC Asian Women's Cup is the second of the two international women's football competitions to be held in India next year, with the 2022 FIFA U-17 Women's Cup being the other.