AFC Asian Cup awards explained

At the end of each AFC Asian Cup final tournament, several awards are presented to the players and teams which have distinguished themselves in various aspects of the match.

Awards

There are currently five post-tournament awards

the Most Valuable Player for best player;
the Top Goalscorer for most prolific goal scorer;
the Best Goalkeeper for most outstanding goalkeeper;
the Team of the Tournament for best combined team of players at the tournament;
the Fair Play Award for the team with the best record of fair play.

Most Valuable Player

Year	Most Valuable Player	Ref.
1956	Not awarded	^[1]
1960
1964
1968
1972	Ebrahim Ashtiani
1976	Ali Parvin
1980	Not awarded
1984	Jia Xiuquan
1988	Kim Joo-sung
1992	Kazuyoshi Miura
1996	Khodadad Azizi
2000	Hiroshi Nanami
2004	Shunsuke Nakamura
2007	Younis Mahmoud
2011	Keisuke Honda
2015	Massimo Luongo
2019	Almoez Ali
2023	Akram Afif

Top Goalscorer

Year	Top Goalscorer(s)	Goals
1956	Nahum Stelmach	4
1960	Cho Yoon-ok	4
1964	Inder Singh Mordechai Spiegler	2
1968	Homayoun Behzadi Giora Spiegel Moshe Romano	4
1972	Hossein Kalani	5
1976	Fathi Kameel Gholam Hossein Mazloumi Nasser Nouraei	3
1980	Choi Soon-ho Behtash Fariba	7
1984	Jia Xiuquan Shahrokh Bayani Nasser Mohammadkhani	3
1988	Lee Tae-ho	3
1992	Fahad Al-Bishi	3
1996	Ali Daei	8
2000	Lee Dong-gook	6
2004	Ali Karimi A'ala Hubail	5
2007	Younis Mahmoud Naohiro Takahara Yasser Al-Qahtani	4
2011	Koo Ja-cheol	5
2015	Ali Mabkhout	5
2019	Almoez Ali	9
2023	Akram Afif	8

Best Goalkeeper

Year	Best Goalkeeper
1984	Abdullah Al-Deayea
1988	Zhang Huikang
1992	Not awarded
1996	Mohamed Al-Deayea
2000	Jiang Jin
2004	Not awarded
2007	Noor Sabri
2011	Not awarded
2015	Mathew Ryan
2019	Saad Al-Sheeb
2023	Meshaal Barsham

Team of the Tournament

By edition

Year	Goalkeepers	Defenders	Midfielders	Forwards
1980^[2]	Nasser Hejazi	Naeem Saad Soh Chin Aun Mahboub Juma'a Mehdi Dinvarzadeh	Abdolreza Barzegari Saad Al-Houti Lee Young-moo	Choi Soon-ho Faisal Al-Dakhil Jasem Yaqoub
1984	Unknown or not awarded
1988^[3] (18 players)	Zhang Huikang Abdullah Al-Deayea	Mohamed Al-Jawad Saleh Nu'eimeh Park Kyung-hoon Chung Yong-hwan	Xie Yuxin Mohamed Salim Mahboub Juma'a Sirous Ghayeghran Chung Hae-won Adel Khamis Abdulaziz Al-Hajeri Byun Byung-joo	Youssef Al-Thunayan Majed Abdullah Kim Joo-sung Wang Baoshan
1992	Unknown or not awarded
1996^[4]	Mohamed Al-Deayea	Abdullah Zubromawi Yousef Saleh Mohammad Khakpour	Mehrdad Minavand Mohamed Ali Khalid Al-Muwallid Saad Bakheet Mubarak	Fahad Al-Mehallel Jasem Al-Huwaidi Ali Daei
2000^[5]	Jiang Jin	Hong Myung-bo Mohammed Al-Khilaiwi Jamal Mubarak	Hiroshi Nanami Nawaf Al-Temyat Abbas Obeid Karim Bagheri Shunsuke Nakamura	Lee Dong-gook Naohiro Takahara
2004^[6]	Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi	Tsuneyasu Miyamoto Yuji Nakazawa Zheng Zhi Mehdi Mahdavikia	Shunsuke Nakamura Shao Jiayi Zhao Junzhe Talal Yousef	A'ala Hubail Ali Karimi
2007^[7]	Lee Woon-jae	Yuji Nakazawa Lucas Neill Bassim Abbas Rahman Rezaei	Shunsuke Nakamura Harry Kewell Lee Chun-soo Nashat Akram	Naohiro Takahara Yasser Al-Qahtani
2011	Not awarded
2015^[8]	Mathew Ryan	Dhurgham Ismail Kwak Tae-hwi Trent Sainsbury Cha Du-ri	Massimo Luongo Omar Abdulrahman Ki Sung-yueng	Ali Mabkhout Tim Cahill Son Heung-min
2019^[9] (23 players)	Alireza Beiranvand Shūichi Gonda Saad Al Sheeb	Bandar Al-Ahbabi Boualem Khoukhi Maya Yoshida Bassam Al-Rawi Yuto Nagatomo Abdelkarim Hassan Kim Min-jae	Omid Ebrahimi Abdulaziz Hatem Ashkan Dejagah Tom Rogic Gaku Shibasaki Hassan Al-Haydos	Akram Afif Almoez Ali Sardar Azmoun Nguyễn Quang Hải Wu Lei Ali Mabkhout Yuya Osako
2023 (1)	Meshaal Barsham	Abdallah Nasib Ali Al-Bulaihi Lucas Mendes	Mehdi Ghayedi Craig Goodwin Hassan Al-Haydos Lee Kang-in	Akram Afif Aymen Hussein Yazan Al-Naimat
2023 (2) (26 players)	Meshaal Barsham Yazeed Abulaila Mathew Ryan	Yazan Al-Arab Aziz Behich Ihsan Haddad Vahdat Hanonov Kim Min-jae Lucas Mendes Abdallah Nasib	Hassan Al-Haydos Wataru Endō Saeid Ezatolahi Jackson Irvine Alireza Jahanbakhsh Ahmed Fatehi Abbosbek Fayzullaev	Akram Afif Almoez Ali Yazan Al-Naimat Sardar Azmoun Lee Kang-in Jaloliddin Masharipov Son Heung-min Musa Al-Taamari Mehdi Taremi

All-time XI

On 12 August 2023, the AFC announced all-time Asian Cup XI selected by fans and experts.^[10]

Fair Play Award

First awarded in 1984

Year	Winner	Ref.
1984
1988	Not awarded
1992
1996
2000
2004
2007
2011
2015		^[11]
2019
2023

Coaches

Wui Hye-deok, posthumously received the AFC Asian Cup winning coaches award. (2010)^[12]

References

News: AFC Asian Cup History Book. March 2019.
Web site: Chin Aun gets the vote too . Google.com . New Straits Times . 2 October 1980.
Web site: Asian Nations Cup 1988 . 16 December 2010 . 12 February 2020 . Bojan . Jovanovic . Ian . King . Neil . Morrison . Majeed . Panahi . Pieter . . Veroeveren.
Web site: كأس آسيا 1996.. عندما انتزع المنتخب السعودي اللقب من الإمارات صاحب الأرض . ar . Sport 360 . 8 December 2018 . 15 June 2020.
Web site: https://worldcdb.com/asiancup2000.htm . ja:アジアカップ2000・レバノン大会 . ja . WorldCup's world . 15 June 2020.
Web site: https://web.archive.org/web/20070119231744/http://2004.afcasiancup.com/en/news/index.asp?aid=36620&cid=1129&amth=8&ayr=2004 . Asian Cup 2004 All-Star team named . AFC Asian Cup . 7 August 2004 . 19 January 2007 . 12 February 2020.
Web site: https://web.archive.org/web/20071011030927/http://www.the-afc.com/english/fanclub/asiancup2007/ . Fanzone . AFC Asian Cup . 11 October 2007 . 12 February 2020.
News: Official All-Star XI. BigSoccer. 18 August 2007 . 4 September 2020.
Web site: AC2015 DREAM TEAM. 1 February 2015. AFC Asian Cup official twitter. 8 July 2015.
News: AFC Asian Cup UAE 2019 Technical Report and Statistics . AFC . 29 May 2019 . 1 January 2020.
News: #AsianCup2023 five-month countdown: Fan-voted all-time AFC Asian Cup Dream XI revealed . Asian Football Confederation . 2023-08-12 . 2023-08-13.
Web site: Asian Cup 2015 - final tournament match details . 31 October 2018.
Web site: Futsal Planet . awards.futsalplanet.com . 26 July 2024.