AFC Coach Education Conference ‘making a difference’

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Kuala Lumpur: The 3rd AFC Coach Education Conference successfully concluded in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia on Thursday, with educators from 45 Member Associations benefiting from the engaging sessions.The three-day conference, with the theme ‘Making a Difference’, focussed on various insightful topics aimed at developing future coaches in the sport.
Chinese Football Association (CFA) Coach Instructor Lars-Sven Isecke was a key speaker in the conference where he shared his experience on the evolving football trends in China PR as well as the importance of understanding the culture of football of each Member Association.

He said: “At a conference like this, you talk to a lot of people who understand football and we can share and exchange knowledge. This can be extremely beneficial because you can learn new things from a small or big football country.

“To be good educators, they must understand the cultural differences. Football is still a uniting factor and we all want to play beautiful football and be successful, but it is important to know that if you want quality, it will take time.”

Football Federation Australia (FFA) Coach Education Director Anthony Frost added that participants will benefit from the conference which focused on educating Asia’s future coaches.

“It is a great opportunity to share ideas and it is a positive step from the AFC to invite MAs to attend. From an Australian perspective, we are always learning and improving – and we are excited to come to these events to gain more knowledge.”

UAE Head of Coaching Abdulla Hassan Abdulla said coach education is important in raising the standards of football in Asia.

“Coach education is a crucial phase in developing football in the country. When you develop coaches, they in turn develop the players. It is related so you need a strong coach education system.”

The conference covered a range of sessions including the development and implications of the AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 while participants also received insights into the coach education practices in Europe.

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Liam Watson is the Co-Founder & Publisher of Soccerscene. He reports widely on football policy, industry matters and technology.

AFC and Visit Saudi team up for global sponsorship

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AFC and Visit Saudi
Image via Visit Saudi

The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) has named Visit Saudi as an Official Global Partner till December 2024. The collaboration will help Visit Saudi’s efforts to promote Saudi Arabia’s rising tourism options to Asian football enthusiasts throughout the world, as well as the expansion of football and sports in the Kingdom.

Beginning with the highly anticipated AFC Asian Cup Qatar 2023, the AFC will offer Visit Saudi with a new, world-class platform to promote Saudi Arabia to millions of enthusiastic Asian football fans across the world.

The agreement covers major AFC National Team competitions such as Asia’s flagship competition – the AFC Asian Cup Qatar 2023 – as well as the AFC U23 Asian Cup Qatar 2024, the AFC Women’s Olympic Qualifying Tournament (Final Round) for Paris 2024, the AFC U20 Women’s Asian Cup 2024, the AFC U17 Women’s Asian Cup 2024, and the AFC Futsal Asian Cup 2024.

The AFC General Secretary Datuk Seri Windsor John spoke on the deal and how the impact will reach different audiences.

“The AFC is pleased to welcome Visit Saudi as our latest Official Global Partner, which once again reiterates the ever-growing stature and profound impact of the AFC’s world-class national teams’ competitions in reaching audiences across the globe,” he stated via press release.

“We are grateful to Visit Saudi for underlining their belief in Asian football and we look forward to working together to create more milestone moments for all our stakeholders.”

The partnership will pave the road for the AFC and Visit Saudi Arabia to create a slew of remarkable activations and promotional initiatives across AFC National Team tournaments that will inform, engage, and delight Asian football fans.

The collaboration includes efforts within Saudi Arabia, during AFC events, and on other platforms around Asia to highlight the finest of Asian football and Saudi Arabia’s diverse and exciting sports and tourist offers.

Asia Football Group (AFG), the AFC’s commercial agency for 2023-2028, will administer this cooperation agreement.

SBS secure exclusive broadcast rights to the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup

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FIFA World Cup Qatar
Image credit: Julian Finney

SBS have announced that they will exclusively broadcast the 2026 FIFA World Cup to Australian audiences, making the broadcaster the home of football for 40 years.

The deal means that SBS will broadcast all of the 104 games of the 2026 World Cup live across its SBS and SBS Viceland channels, and its SBS On Demand streaming platform.

SBS broadcast its first FIFA World Cup in 1986, when Mexico hosted the tournament and has become a major driver of revenue for the multicultural broadcaster, which is partly funded by advertising.

SBS Managing Director James Taylor explained how SBS were the perfect broadcaster for the world’s game.

“Football is in the DNA of SBS. We could not be more thrilled to announce that we will broadcast the 2026 tournament from North America, which will have more teams, more matches and draw more eyeballs than ever before,” he said via media release.

“We are bringing every match, live, free and exclusively in searing high definition.”

As for what’s further ahead on the horizon, it was also recently confirmed that Football Australia would not be putting in a formal bid for the 2034 FIFA Men’s World Cup, with Saudi Arabia becoming the only eligible bidder by the time the Wednesday morning deadline arrived.

It’s for sure a bitter blow for a country that showed the world that they are capable of holding a successful international football tournament, with the 2023 Women’s World Cup breaking attendance records and ticket sales exceeding the 1.8 million mark, another record that was smashed – football is well and truly growing in Australia.

However, this move by SBS to secure full broadcasting rights ensures football fans in Australia can continue to watch every World Cup game in an era where streaming services like Paramount+ and Optus Sport have handled many of the big domestic and international league and cup matches behind a subscription.

The broadcaster’s formula of providing full matches along with “mini match” and short highlights via SBS On Demand and the SBS sport YouTube channel helped drive millions of views and gave the fans a good amount of digital content to consume.

This broadcast deal is fantastic news for all Australian football fans who will benefit from not being restricted on watching the biggest sporting tournament on the planet in 2026.

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