Bangladesh will play Qatar away on December 4, confirmed by the Asian Football Confederation as the first fixture of the Asian Qualifiers for the Fifa World Cup Qatar 2022 and AFC Asian Cup China 2023 in over a year.
The Group E clash was previously scheduled to be held on October 13 but later got postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Bangladesh lost to the Asian champion 2-0 in the first-leg in Dhaka on October 10, last year.
The rescheduled Match Day 8 clash will be the first and only Asian Qualifiers match to be held in 2020, with the change in schedule approved by Fifa as well as the two participating member associations, says the AFC website.
Bangladesh are currently preparing for the two Fifa friendlies against Nepal on November 13 and 17 after which they will fly to Qatar.
Only a couple of days left for the first official Bangladesh game in almost eight months.
Posted by Sports Tribune on Wednesday, 11 November 2020
Head coach Jamie Day seeks at least two practice matches in Qatar before facing the strongest opponent in the group.
“It’s extremely tough match whenever we play. We will do our best to prepare the team. They have two games against Nepal and I want two games in Qatar before we play,” the English tactician reacted after the confirmation of rescheduled fixtures.
Qatar are the current leader of Group E with 13 points from five matches, while Bangladesh, who have claimed one point from four outings, sit bottom of the table.
It was also agreed during AFC competitions committee’s virtual meeting that all the Asian Qualifiers Round 2 matches should be completed by June 15, 2021 with Match Day 7 and 8 in March 2021 and Match Day 9 and 10 in June 2021.
