The Chinese men's soccer team set sail for a direct flight from Shanghai to Dubai, UAE, this afternoon, and is expected to arrive at 7:15 p.m. local time on the 18th. After a short break, the team will move to Abu Dhabi to start the preparations for the Asian Cup.
In Abu Dhabi's preparations, the national team will start a warm-up match against Oman and is scheduled to play two teaching matches against the UAE's local team. However, due to the adjustment of the opponent's schedule, the original warm-up match with India may be cancelled, the team is actively looking for alternative opponents. January 7, the team will go to Qatar, the final sprint training. Although the preparation is in order, the same group of opponents is also secretly layout. Meanwhile, the Tajikistan team has assembled in the United Arab Emirates, where they will warm up with a number of teams, including Vietnam. Looking at Tajikistan's training roster, there are very few players over the age of 30, and 12 young players, eight of whom are under the age of 21. Croatian coach Šegot's youthful philosophy has had a significant impact on the team. Recall that last week, the Lebanese Football Association (LFA) announced that former national team coach Radulovic would be back at the helm to lead the team to the Asian Cup. He embarked on a three-day meeting with FA stakeholders to discuss and finalize the Asian Cup training roster. According to reports, the training will take place from December 19 to 28 and a total of 29 people have been selected, eight of whom had participated in the Asian Cup in 2019 with Radulovic. However, Radulovic could still make changes to the list after the training. Key players such as Ayub and Darwish are expected to return to the squad after recovering from injuries. In addition, he has proposed to the FA to introduce player data software to improve the team with the help of big data analysis. As the hosts, the Qatar national team is in the same group with our country. Given that the 12th round of the Qatar League will be held from December 20 to 22, head coach Marks needs to organize the team to enter the training state quickly after the end of the league. The Football Association has scheduled a warm-up match against Cambodia on December 31 and another warm-up match on January 12 before the match against Lebanon. After the matches, Marks will make adjustments to the team roster. According to the Asian Cup system, the 24 teams in the group stage will be divided into six groups, with the top two teams in each group and the four teams with the best results advancing to the round of 16.
