Bahrain and Uzbekistan seal final places

Bahrain and Uzbekistan snatched the last two available places for the 2007 Asian Cup by winning their final qualifiers in midweek.

Bahrain beat Kuwait 2-1 in Manama and Uzbekistan defeated Qatar 2-0 in Tashkent to complete the list of 16 nations for Asia's biggest football tournament.

In the final round of pool matches, Kazuki Ganaha scored twice as defending champions Japan defeated Saudi Arabia 3-1 to leapfrog to the top of the Group A standings and guarantee being seeded for the finals.

Reza Enyati and Hossein Badamaki scored as Iran beat an understrength South Korean team 2-0 to top Group B, and Mohammad Omar's two second-half goals helped the United Arab Emirates fight off a resilient Pakistan to win 3-2 and head the Group C standings.

Australia, who had a bye in the final round after Lebanon pulled out of the qualifying tournament, finished top of Group D while Iraq topped Group E after Alwan Ahmad's second-half equaliser earned his side a 1-1 draw with China.

Qatar finished top of Group F despite losing their final match to Uzbekistan, who only needed a point to be assured of their place in the finals ahead of Hong Kong, who beat Bangladesh 2-0 in their last qualifier.

The 2007 Asian Cup will be co-hosted by Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and Vietnam from July 7-29. It will be the 14th edition of the tournament, which was first played for in 1956.

It was held every four years with the last edition staged in China in 2004 but was brought forward to 2007 to avoid clashing with the 2008 Beijing Olympics.

The four host nations automatically qualified for the finals and the remaining 12 spots were filled by Australia, Bahrain, China, Iran, Iraq, Japan, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, United Arab Emirates and Uzbekistan.