BASKETBALL – Bahrain were announced yesterday as part of a tough group for the first round of pre-qualifiers for the Fiba Asia Cup 2029.
The opening phase of the qualification process is scheduled to be played later this year from August 24 to September 1 at four host cities across the continent, Fiba’s regional office for Asia revealed.
The hosts include Dubai in the UAE – where the kingdom’s senior men’s basketball national team will compete – along with Atyrau in Kazakhstan, Seremban in Malaysia, and Ulaanbaatar in Mongolia.
Those cities will stage the maiden step towards identifying the teams that will feature in the Fiba Asia Cup 2029 – the flagship continental competition for senior men’s squads in the continent.
The pre-qualifiers will be played over two rounds. At the end of these, eight teams will join 16 other nations with automatic berths – by virtue of their participation in the previous edition of the Fiba Asia Cup last year in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia – in the Fiba Asia Cup 2029 qualifiers.
In the pre-qualifiers’ opening round, Bahrain are one of 17 sides. They have been placed in Group A alongside Kuwait, Oman, Nepal, and divisional hosts UAE.
Group B, to be played in Atyrau, is composed of Palestine, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Kyrgyzstan, and hosts Kazakhstan.
Group C in Seremban comprises Indonesia, Hong Kong, and hosts Malaysia; while Group D in Ulaanbaatar features Thailand, Vietnam, Fiji, and hosts Mongolia.
Each group in pre-qualifying’s first round will be played in a round robin during the above-mentioned period.
The top three teams from each group will then advance to the second stage, where they will be divided into two further groups of six teams each.
The hosts for the second round, will be from among the participating teams and will be announced later.
Priority and preference will be given to a national federation that already hosted one of the first round groups.
Each group in the pre-qualifiers’ second round will also feature a round-robin, to be played between November 23 and December 1.
The top four teams from each group in the second round will make it to the Fiba Asia Cup 2029 qualifiers, joining the 16 nations that competed in the Fiba Asia Cup 2025.
The Fiba Asia Cup 2029 qualifiers will then take place across three windows in February of 2028, November of 2028, and February of 2029, followed by two Fiba Asia Cup 2029 qualifying tournaments for third-placed teams to determine the final 16-country line-up in the Fiba Asia Cup 2029.
In the qualifiers for the Fiba Asia Cup 2025, Bahrain narrowly missed out on a berth in the tournament proper after losing in the western region’s final qualifying tournament held last March, when they went up against India and Iraq. Those games took place in the kingdom.
Bahrain have qualified for the Fiba Asia Cup nine times in the past – the most recent of which was for the 2022 tournament, held in Indonesia. They finished 13th then.
The Bahrainis’ best-ever classification in the highly competitive event was in its 1997 edition, when they claimed 10th place overall.
patrick@gdnmedia.bh
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