{"id":74686,"date":"2026-08-18T08:48:08","date_gmt":"2026-08-18T08:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/74686\/"},"modified":"2026-08-18T08:48:08","modified_gmt":"2026-08-18T08:48:08","slug":"afc-champions-league-two-draw-teams-groups-confirmed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/74686\/","title":{"rendered":"AFC Champions League Two Draw: Teams, Groups Confirmed"},"content":{"rendered":"

The draw for the AFC Champions League Two has been completed, with both Adelaide United and Melbourne Victory\u2019s paths to Asian glory now set.<\/p>\n

Having failed to qualify for the AFC Champions League Elite through the playoffs Adelaide dropped down into the ACL Two, where they were seeded in Pot One.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile Melbourne Victory secured their spot in this season\u2019s competition after finishing as the third-best Australian side in the 2025\/26 Isuzu UTE A-League.<\/p>\n

Read on to find out who both sides will face in this season\u2019s AFC Champions League Two!<\/p>\n

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ADELAIDE UNITED<\/p>\n

Seeded in Pot One, Adelaide United were one of four top seeds in this year\u2019s competition alongside Gangwon (KOR), Machida Zelvia (JPN) and FC Seoul (KOR).<\/p>\n

Airton Andrioli\u2019s side were drawn in Group F alongside Thailand\u2019s BG Pathum United, who are making their second consecutive appearance in the ACL Two.<\/p>\n

Also joining the Reds in Group F will be Lion City Sailors of Singapore, who famously knocked out Sydney FC in the semi-finals two seasons ago.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile the fourth side drawn into Group F is two-time Hong Kong Premier League champions Tai Po, who will be making their first appearance in the ACL Two.<\/p>\n

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\"\"<\/p>\n

MELBOURNE VICTORY<\/p>\n

Melbourne Victory were housed in Pot Two for the 2026\/27 ACL Two, alongside BG Pathum United (THA), Shanghai Shenhua (CHN) and Kuching City (MAS).<\/p>\n

Giovanni Savarese\u2019s side will compete in Group E alongside Korean giants FC Seoul, <\/p>\n

The third side drawn out of the hat were six-time Vietnamese champions The Cong \u2013 Viettel, who last played in the competition back in 2022.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile the final team drawn alongside Victory in Group E will be the winner of Indonesia\u2019s Persib Bandung and Manila Digger FC of the Philippines, with the two sides facing off in a playoff on August 31.<\/p>\n

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When will the games be played?<\/p>\n

The Group Stage matches will take place between Tuesday, September 15 and Wednesday, December 3 with both the Reds and Victory playing three home matches as well as three away matches in a round-robin format.<\/p>\n

The 2026\/27 campaign will mark Adelaide United\u2019s return to AFC Champions League competition, with the Reds set to test themselves against some of Asia\u2019s leading clubs.<\/p>\n

As for Victory, the four-time A-League champions are back competing in Asia for the first time since 2020.<\/p>\n

What prize money is on offer?<\/p>\n

Both Adelaide United and Melbourne Victory have netted themselves a fee of $300,000 USD (roughly $424,000 AUD) just for qualifying for the tournament.<\/p>\n

When it comes to winning matches, should the Reds and Victory chalk up some victories then they\u2019ll receive $50,000 USD per win and the prize money on offer for latter-stage qualification is also very helpful.<\/p>\n

Round of 16 qualification will see clubs earn $80,000 USD, quarter-final qualification will see them earn $160,000 USD and getting to the Semi-finals is worth $240,000 USD.<\/p>\n

The prize for the winner? $2.5 million USD (roughly $3.5m AUD) whilst the runner-up receives $1 million USD.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The draw for the AFC Champions League Two has been completed, with both Adelaide United and Melbourne Victory\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":74687,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[1264,1417,1418,260,152],"class_list":["post-74686","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-melbourne","tag-a-league-men","tag-a-leagues","tag-almfeatured","tag-melbourne","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74686","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=74686"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/74686\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/74687"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=74686"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=74686"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=74686"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}