Thailand to host AFC Women's Club Championship 2022

Gokulam Kerala will represent India in the competition.

The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) has today confirmed the Football Association of Thailand (FA Thailand) as the host Member Association (MA) for the upcoming AFC Women’s Club Championship – Pilot Tournament in the East region.

In addition, the match schedule has also been finalised with the three teams in the East – Taichung Blue Whale FC from Chinese Taipei and Myanmar’s ISPE Women FC alongside a club from Thailand to be decided by June 2022 – scheduled to compete from August 15 to 21, 2022.

Earlier, the Uzbekistan Football Association (UFA) was confirmed as the host MA for the West, which will comprise participating clubs from the host, India, Islamic Republic of Iran and Jordan to be staged from August 20 to 26, marking the first time the competition will be held across the two regions.

While the final cast of participating clubs will be confirmed and communicated in due course, this year’s edition will also see the introduction of the first-ever regional Final contest between the East and West group leaders, which will take place in conjunction with the AFC Cup 2022™ Final on October 22.

The winners will join 2019 victors Nippon TV Beleza from Japan and 2021 champions Amman Club from Jordan in the pilot editions’ honours roll, with the ultimate aim of chasing Continental club glory ahead of the inaugural AFC Women’s Champions League in 2024.

This is the third time that the competition will be played. A total of seven teams will participate in the AFC Women's Club Championship this time. The last two editions remained witness to four teams playing in the tournament. In 2021, Gokulam Kerala represented India in the competition after they were crowned champions of the Indian Women's League. Notably, Gokulam Kerala went on to defeat FC Bunyodkar of Uzbekistan in the competition.