The footballers of the Turkmenistan national team have started preparing for the second round match of the 2027 Asian Cup qualifying tournament, which will take place on June 10 at the central arena of the multifunctional “Ashgabat” stadium.
According to the Football Federation of Turkmenistan, 30 players have been invited to the training camp of the country’s main team, 23 of whom will be included in the final squad for the match. By decision of the coaching staff, the extended squad includes foreign-based players, including midfielder Teymur Charyev from Belarusian club Torpedo-BelAZ and forward Mikhail Titov from Kyrgyz club Uzgen.
The national team’s training sessions are held twice a day at the Nisa Stadium. The preparation program runs until June 9 and includes physical exercises, tactical analysis, and practicing game situations. The training process is led by the new head coach Rovshen Meredov, who replaced Mergen Orazov two weeks before the match against Thailand.
Both Turkmenistan and Thailand enter the upcoming qualifying match as leaders of Group D. In the first round, Turkmenistan’s footballers secured an away victory over Chinese Taipei with a score of 2-1, while Thailand defeated Sri Lanka at home 1-0.
It is worth noting that the winners of the six qualifying groups will advance to the final tournament of the 2027 Asian Cup, which will be held for the first time in Saudi Arabia.
Earlier, 18 teams have already secured their places in the final stage of the 2027 Asian Cup. These are the participants of the third round of qualification for the 2026 World Cup: Australia, Bahrain, Indonesia, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, Qatar, China, North Korea, South Korea, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Palestine, Uzbekistan, Japan, and Saudi Arabia (as the host).
Turkmen footballers have participated twice in the final stages of the Asian Cup. The first time was in 2004, when the tournament was held in China, and the second time was in 2019 in the United Arab Emirates. In the previous edition, the Turkmenistan national team finished third in qualifying Group E and did not qualify for the final tournament of the Asian Cup, which took place in 2023 in Qatar.
The Asian Cup football tournament is held every four years. Its first edition was in 1956. Since 2007, the tournament has been held in odd-numbered years. The current Asian champion is Qatar, which has won the continental trophy twice, in 2019 and 2023.
