Bahrain national

Vivekananda Yuba Bharati Krirangan: Kalinga Super Cup winners East Bengal football club have been drawn to play Altyn Asyr FC (Turkmenistan) in a Preliminary Stage match of the inaugural AFC Champions League (ACL) Two on August 14 at the Vivekananda Yuba Bharati Krirangan in Kolkata.

Four teams, including East Bengal FC, are competing for the two available slots in the ACL Two Group Stage in the West Zone: Bahrain’s Al Ahli will battle it out with Kuwait’s Kuwait SC for the other slot at the Bahrain National Stadium in Riffa.

In the ACL Two, 32 teams will compete in the newly-introduced second-tier men’s club competition. While 27 teams from across 21 Member Associations (MAs) – 12 from the West region and 15 from the East – qualify directly to the group stage, along with the three teams (two West, one East) that will be eliminated from the Preliminary Stage of the AFC Champions League Elite tournament.