Afghanistan Football Federation said the National Football Team is preparing for the third round of the 2019 AFC Asian Cup qualifying round.

The qualification process involves four rounds, where the first two doubled as the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualifying rounds for Asian teams

Afghanistan is in Group C along with Jordan, Vietnam and Cambodia and their first match will be held in March. The venue has still to be decided on.

“We are in a good group and the chance of us rising is high, because we had two matches against Cambodia where we defeated the team in both matches. Also, our players are better, compared to those from Vietnam and Jordan. We hope that we finish top in the group,” said Ali Kazemi, spokesman for the Afghanistan Football Federation.

“Playing in the third round of the AFC Asian qualifying round is a proud moment for us and I believe we will be on the top of the group,” said Tahir Raufi, technical deputy of the federation.

He said: “We continue our efforts to conduct exercises inside and outside the country ahead of the match in order to train our players.”

The 2019 AFC Asian Cup qualifying round is organized by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) to determine the teams that will take part in the 2019 AFC Asian Cup - the 17th edition of the international men's football championship in Asia.

For the first time, the Asian Cup final will be contested by 24 teams, having recently been expanded from the 16-team format that had been used since 2004.