The Russian national football team can take part in the tournament of the Central Asian Football Association (CAFA), which will be held in Tashkent and Bishkek in June 2023, Match TV reports, citing the press secretary of the Football Federation of Tajikistan, Faridun Saliev.
“The Russian team will take part in the first CAFA championship which will be held from June 9 to 21 this year,” he said.
All six CAFA members — Tajikistan, Iran, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan and Afghanistan have confirmed their participation in the tournament. Also, CAFA invited one of the Asian teams to participate in the new tournament.
Eight national teams will be divided into two groups of four. Matches will be played in a round-robin system. The group winners will play in the final. The runners will vie for the third-place match.
According to the Championat, the tournament will have a friendly status allowing the Russian team to play.
Due to sanctions from UEFA and FIFA, Russian clubs and teams cannot take part in international competitions. At the end of last year, the RFU executive committee created a working group that will deal with the issue of transition from UEFA to the Asian Football Confederation. This group will study the issue of moving to Asia - all its pros and cons.
The Central Asian Football Association (CAFA) is a division within the Asian Football Federation that oversees football in the region which includes Afghanistan, Iran, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan. The sub-federation was created on the initiative of Iran, which previously belonged to the same association with the countries of the Middle East: the decision to secede was made due to disagreements with a number of Arab representatives.
The association began functioning in January 2015.
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