Afro-Asian Cup of Nations

Organising body	CAF and AFC
Founded	1978; 45 years ago (1978)
Abolished	2007; 16 years ago (2007)
Region	Africa Asia
Number of teams	2
Last champions	Japan (2007)
Most successful team(s)	Japan (2 titles)

The Afro-Asian Cup of Nations, also called the AFC Asia/Africa Challenge Cup, was an intercontinental football competition endorsed by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) and the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), contested between representative nations from these confederations, usually the winners of the Africa Cup of Nations and the winners of the AFC Asian Cup or the Asian Games. All editions were official competitions of CAF and AFC^[1] and indirectly also of FIFA.^[2] For FIFA statute, official competitions are those for representative teams organized by FIFA or any confederation. The most successful team is Japan with 2 championships.

History

• The first edition was in 1978. Iran defeated Ghana 3–0 in the first leg, but the second leg was cancelled due to political problems in Iran, and the trophy was not awarded.
• The competition was completed in 1985, 1987, 1991, 1993 and 1995, but the 1989 competition was cancelled.
• The 1997 edition was severely delayed to 1999, while the "true" 1999 edition (between Egypt and Iran) was also cancelled.
• The competition was discontinued following a CAF decision on July 30, 2000, after AFC representatives had supported Germany rather than South Africa in the vote for hosting the 2006 World Cup. The competition was scheduled to be resumed in 2005 with the match Tunisia-Japan, but was then cancelled once again.
• The competition resumed in 2007 under the name "AFC Asia/Africa Challenge Cup". The 2008 edition was scheduled to be played in November 2008 between Iraq and Egypt in the neutral venue of Saudi Arabia, but was eventually cancelled.

Results and statistics

Finals

Year	Hosts		Final
			Team 1	Score	Team 2
1978 Details	Iran		Iran	3–0	Ghana
	Ghana			Cancelled[n 1]
1985 Details	Cameroon		Cameroon	4–1	Saudi Arabia
	Saudi Arabia			1–2
1987 Details	Qatar		South Korea	1–1 (a.e.t.) (4–3 p)	Egypt
1991 Details	Iran		Iran	2–1	Algeria
	Algeria			0–1
1993 Details	Japan		Japan	1–0 (a.e.t.)	Ivory Coast
1995 Details	Uzbekistan		Uzbekistan	2–3	Nigeria
	Nigeria			0–1
1997 Details	South Africa		South Africa	1–0	Saudi Arabia
	Saudi Arabia			0–0
2007 Details	Japan		Japan	4–1	Egypt

Most successful national teams

Team	Winners	Runners-Up
Japan	2 (1993, 2007)	—
Cameroon	1 (1985)	—
South Korea	1 (1987)	—
Algeria	1 (1991)	—
Nigeria	1 (1995)	—
South Africa	1 (1999)	—
Saudi Arabia	—	2 (1985, 1999)
Egypt	—	2 (1987, 2007)
Iran	—	1 (1991)
Ivory Coast	—	1 (1993)
Uzbekistan	—	1 (1995)

Results by confederation