The Asian Football Confederation (AFC) drew the preliminary stage matchups for the FIFA World Cup 2026 and AFC Asian Cup 2027 qualifiers on Thursday. Nepal was drawn against Laos, with the first leg to be played on October 12 and the second on October 17.
The preliminary stage will see 20 teams, ranked 27-46 in the FIFA rankings, compete for 10 spots in the second round. The 10 winners from the preliminary stage will join the 26 teams that have already qualified for the second round.
The second round will see 36 teams divided into nine groups of four. The top two teams from each group will advance to the third round and automatically qualify for the AFC Asian Cup. Each group’s third and fourth-placed teams will go to the fourth round.
In addition to Nepal, the other teams drawn in Path 1 of the preliminary stage are Hong Kong, Indonesia, Chinese Taipei, Maldives, Yemen, Afghanistan, Singapore, Myanmar, and Cambodia. The teams drawn in Path 2 are Macau, Mongolia, Bhutan, Laos, Bangladesh, Brunei, Timor-Leste, Pakistan, Guam, and Sri Lanka.
The other matchups in the preliminary stage are as follows:

The FIFA World Cup 2026 will be held in the United States, Mexico, and Canada, while the AFC Asian Cup 2027 will be held in Saudi Arabia.