Organised by the ASEAN Football Federation (AFF), the South East Asian football tournament is now in its 15th year. The tournament, now renamed the ASEAN Championship, features 12 participating countries divided into three groups of four teams each.
Interestingly, this two-year competition includes a non-Southeast Asian country, Australia. This may come as a surprise to some.
But since early 2006, the landscape of Asian football has changed with the acceptance of Australia into the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). This historic move ended Australia's long association with the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC).
Australia's presence in Southeast Asia was further strengthened in 2013 when it joined the ASEAN Football Confederation (AFF). The move gave the Socceroos the opportunity to compete in several prestigious regional tournaments, including the AFF Cup, now known as the ASEAN Championship.
Alongside Australia, other non-Southeast Asian nations to have participated in the ASEAN Championship ( AFF Cup at the time) include Iran (2012) and Japan (2014). Both countries went on to win the AFF Cup in those years.
In addition, countries such as Bangladesh (2006), Bahrain (2008) and China (2010) have all competed in the AFF U-16 Cup despite not being part of Southeast Asia or even the AFF.
But why did they join?
These countries took part in the AFF Cup as " invitation teams ". These teams are not members of the ASEAN Football Confederation (AFF), but are invited to take part in tournaments organised by the AFF.
Unlike AFF members, who automatically qualify for the annual tournament, invitation teams must be specifically invited by the AFF to take part.
Interestingly, the first ASEAN Championship, known as the Tiger Cup in 1996, also featured some Southeast Asian countries as invitational teams. At that time, Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, the Philippines and Thailand were regular participants, while Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam were invited teams.
This is because the six countries are the founding countries of the AFF, so the 4 participating countries are invitation teams.
