Eight teams remain in the title frame as the final stages of the AFC Champions League Elite are set to be played over the coming week-and-a-half.
The winner of the second edition of the newly reformatted tournament will be crowned in Saudi Arabia on 25 April, with that club also qualifying for both the forthcoming edition of the FIFA Intercontinental Cup™ and the next FIFA Club World Cup™.
Two Japanese clubs, a pair of Saudi sides and teams from Malaysia, Qatar, Thailand and United Arab Emirates remain in contention. The Saudi Arabian port city of Jeddah will play host to all the final knockout stage action, commencing with this week’s quarter-finals.
Ambitious Kobe have made no secret of their desire to be viewed as ‘Asia’s No1 club’ and they stand just three matches away from being able to formally declare that status. In the first year under the guidance of ex-Sanfrecce Hiroshima coach Michael Skibbe, the Japanese club have been in strong domestic form although they do enter with several key fitness concerns surrounding goalkeeper Daiya Maekawa and central defender Thuler.
Al Sadd are one of the continent’s most storied club sides and knocked out the might of Al Hilal on penalties earlier in the week in rescheduled Round of 16 action in the western side of the continent. Led by former Italy and Saudi Arabia coach Roberto Mancini, the Qatari heavyweights will have to overcome a quick turnaround here, having played 120 minutes against Hilal in a match where Mancini didn’t make any substitutions.
The defending champions are also coming off a taxing win against Al Duhail in the Round of 16 from earlier in the week. There, a 117th minute Riyad Mahrez free-kick won it for Al Ahli. Matthias Jaissle’s side will also have the sizeable advantage of being able to play in the home surrounds of the King Abdullah Sports City Stadium. They face a hugely ambitious JDT side that have bossed the domestic scene in Malaysia for near-on a generation. Last month, the Southern Tigers won a remarkable 12th consecutive Super League title. Even more astonishingly they haven’t lost a league match since April 2021. They have though never ventured this far in the Champions League and will also be sweating on the fitness of winger Arif Aiman, one of Southeast Asian football’s most exciting young talents.
Upstart Japanese hopefuls Zelvia face one of the continent’s most iconic teams in the third quarter-final. A decade ago Machida were lingering in the third-tier of Japanese domestic football and only reached J1 for the first time in 2024 under the guidance of a veteran coach who had spent his entire, three-decade, career working at a high school team. This is the first time that the club has been involved in any sort of continental competition but they are well backed financially and boast a squad containing several former and current Japanese national team players.
That still pales in comparison to the might of an Al Ittihad side that won back-to-back editions of the Champions League (in its former guise) in 2004 and 2005 and which has more than two dozen domestic titles to its name. Now led by Sergio Conceicao and boasting the likes of Seleção string-puller Fabinho, former Portugal regular Danilo, French forward Moussa Diaby and a host of other international stars, they are also set to play in their home city of Jeddah. Like Al Ahli and Al Sadd they are though also coming off a 120-minute encounter earlier in the week as a Fabinho penalty in the tenth additional minute of the second period of extra time saw them pip Al Wahda in dramatic circumstances.
The second of the Southeast Asian superpowers is a Buriram United side that are flying high in domestic action, sitting 16 points clear at the head of the Thai League 1. Under the guidance of English coach Mark Jackson, the Thunder Castle boast a squad stacked with Thai internationals as well as a host of other regional stars.
They’ll face a Shabab Al Ahli outfit that are coming off an impressive 3-0 win over Iranian side Tractor in the Round of 16 and looking to build on strong domestic form. That win earlier in the week saw head coach Paulo Sousa feature eight Brazilian players and that core group, along with IR Iran stars Sardar Azmoun and Saeid Ezatolahi, could well help determine their progression hopes.
