One of five AFC zonal regions, the East Asian Football Federation arguably serves a greater purpose as a political and voting block than it does in terms of football development.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Spanning a sweeping reach from the remote Mongolian north down to the Pacific dots of Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands, there\u2019s little culturally, linguistically or otherwise to thread the ten member associations together.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yet together they are and together they gather every couple of years for the EAFF E-1 Football Championships.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
On both the men\u2019s and women\u2019s sides it’s basically the same nations that trot out for most tournaments and mostly it\u2019s viewed as a developmental event where nations send younger squads with an eye to the future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The forthcoming edition, to be held in pretty much the most obscure regions of Japan you could find (in Aichi and Ibaraki prefectures), is no different although, crucially, it comes less than half a year before Japan and Korea will face the global elite in Qatar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
With only one final international window remaining for coaches to trim their squads for the World Cup, the current EAFF Championships then serve as a final stage for fringe members to put their names forward for the flight to Doha in November.<\/p>\n\n\n\n