As a result of the draw for the first round of joint qualifiers for the 2026 FIFA World Cup and the 2027 Asian Cup, which took place on Thursday at the AFC headquarters in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Bangladesh will face a Maldives team that is formidable while also being a team with whom they are already acquainted.
The first match for Bangladesh (ranked 189th) will be on the road against Maldives (155) on October 12. The second match will be played at home on October 17.
When these two teams met in the past, it was during the group round of the 2023 SAFF Championship in Bengaluru a month ago. The guys playing in red and green came out on top with a 3-1 victory. Maldives, on the other hand, has defeated Bangladesh in five of their past seven matches played against them since 2011.
Bangladesh had previously prevailed against Laos by a score of 1-0 on aggregate in the qualifying round for the 2022 World Cup, which was held at the same stage.
The draw for today was intended to be done with the worst 18 teams, but instead it was held with the bottom 20 teams since Sri Lanka was included in the draw. This means that the draw will be held with the bottom 20 teams regardless of whether or not FIFA lifts its ban before the qualifications begin.
The top 26 teams, along with the 10 teams who emerged victorious from Round 1, will compete immediately in Round 2.
The draw for Round 2 was conducted later in the day, and the results revealed that if Bangladesh were to win their match against Maldives, they would be placed in Group I together with Australia, Palestine, and Lebanon.