On January 27, Beijing time, the 7th round of the World Preliminary Round of 12 in The Asian Zone will kick off. After the first 6 rounds of competition, the situation has gradually become clear. In this round of competition, Iran, South Korea and Saudi Arabia are expected to qualify in the 3rd round in advance. The Chinese men's football team is on the line, and if it loses to Japan, it will basically bid farewell to the World Cup.
In Group A, Iran and South Korea are both unbeaten in the first six rounds. Iran ranked first with 5 wins, 1 draw and 16 points, South Korea ranked second with 4 wins, 2 draws and 14 points, while the Uae, Lebanon, Iraq and Syria had only 6 points, 5 points, 4 points and 2 points respectively.
In this round of competition, Iran and South Korea can qualify in the first 3 rounds as long as they defeat Iraq and Lebanon respectively, and lock in the tickets for the World Cup. The biggest point difference between the remaining four teams is no more than 4 points, all of which retain hopes of advancing to the play-offs.
In Group B, which chinese fans are quite concerned about, Saudi Arabia has a clear advantage, leading them with 5 wins and 1 draw and 16 points, 4 points ahead of the Japanese team behind them, and 5 points ahead of the 3rd place Australia. If Oman is successfully defeated in this round, Saudi Arabia will almost ensure the top two places in the group and thus reach the World Cup finals.
As for the situation of the Chinese men's football team, it is not optimistic, because Saudi Arabia has basically determined the qualification, the Chinese men's football team can only compete with Australia and Japan for another direct qualifying place. In this round, Australia will face Vietnam, who has lost six consecutive games. The "Kangaroo Army" will most likely give Vietnam 7 consecutive defeats, which means that once the national football team loses to Japan, the point difference with Australia will reach 9 points, coupled with the huge disadvantage of the current goal difference, which is undoubtedly equivalent to declaring the game out of the 3 rounds in advance.
Notably, the team that qualifies for the Asian Zone play-offs will play against the 5th place from the South American qualifiers. Judging from the current points situation in the South American qualifiers, the probability is against Colombia, Chile, Uruguay, Peru and other strong teams, and the possibility of the Chinese men's football team relying on the play-offs to advance is very small.