South Asian Football Federation


South Asian Football Federation , founded in 1997, is an association of the football playing nations in South Asia and is part of the larger Asian Football Confederation. Its founding members are Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. Bhutan joined the federation in 2000 and Afghanistan in 2005. In February 2015, captain Haroon Amiri announced that Afghanistan had officially left the SAFF for the new Central Asian Football Association.
The current champions of SAFF are the Maldives after a 2–1 win over India at the 2018 SAFF Championship and in women football India is the present champion after a 3–1 victory over Nepal at the 2019 SAFF Women's Championship.

History

The SAFF was founded in 1997, with Bangladesh, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka. In 2000, they expanded to 7 members, adding Bhutan. In 2005, Afghanistan joined too, but they left in 2015 to join the new CAFA.

Presidents

Because of health issues in 2016, Rodrigo Ranjith replaced Salahuddin as acting president for two months. Salahuddin was voted to resume presidency in March 2016.

Member associations

Former members

Afghanistan, who had joined the South Asian Football Federation in the 2005 expansion 2 phase, left the association in 2015 to become a founding member of Central Asian Football Association.

Competitions

The South Asian Football Federation runs several competitions on subcontinental level.

Club

The South Asian Football Federation announced in April 2011 that they had decided to start a new tournament for association football club sides, the SAFF Club Championship, with the inaugural edition to be held in Bangladesh from 1–15 September of the same year. However the competition was postponed and desires to revive the competition were again announced in July 2013 but the competition has still not started with accusations that India, the prime nation in the competition, are not altogether interested in participating.
Sri Lanka was supposed to host first edition in August 2014. That however did not happen.
A new possible start was set for December 2016 but later announced that 2017 would see the first edition. This again was changed and announced that 2018 would be the start of the tournament.

Current title holders

Rankings

are calculated by FIFA.

Men's National Teams

AFCFIFACountryPoints+/−
191081187 2
321551038 4
34170974 3
38187914 3
40189911 0
45200867 2
46206853 3

Leading Men's Team:

ImageSize = width:250 height:700
PlotArea = left:40 right:0 bottom:5 top:10
DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy
Period = from:01/01/1997 till:04/04/2019
ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:1 start:1997
TimeAxis = orientation:vertical format:yyyy
Colors =
id:IND value:blue
id:MAD value:white
id:BHU value:yellow
id:NEP value:red
id:AFG value:green
PlotData=
bar:Leaders width:25 mark: align:left fontsize:S
from:01/01/1997 till:01/06/2004 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/06/2004 till:01/09/2004 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/09/2004 till:01/11/2004 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/11/2004 till:01/12/2004 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/12/2004 till:01/07/2006 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/07/2006 till:01/10/2006 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/10/2006 till:01/11/2006 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/11/2006 till:01/12/2006 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/12/2006 till:01/03/2007 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/03/2007 till:01/08/2007 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/08/2007 till:01/08/2009 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/08/2009 till:01/09/2009 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/09/2009 till:01/09/2010 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/09/2010 till:01/10/2010 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/10/2010 till:01/07/2011 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/07/2011 till:01/08/2012 shift: text:"Nepal" color:NEP
from:01/08/2012 till:01/03/2013 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/03/2013 till:01/02/2014 shift: text:"Afghanistan" color:AFG
from:01/02/2014 till:01/06/2014 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:01/06/2014 till:01/06/2015 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:01/06/2015 till:02/07/2015 shift: text:"India" color:IND
from:02/07/2015 till:02/06/2016 shift: text:"Maldives" color:MAD
from:02/06/2016 till:end shift: text:"India" color:IND

Women's National Teams

Leading Women's team:

ImageSize = width:150 height:300
PlotArea = left:40 right:0 bottom:5 top:10
DateFormat = dd/mm/yyyy
Period = from:01/01/2010 till:12/07/2019
ScaleMajor = unit:year increment:1 start:2010
TimeAxis = orientation:vertical format:yyyy
Colors =
id:India value:blue
PlotData=
bar:Leaders width:25 mark: align:left fontsize:S
from:01/01/2010 till:end shift: text:"India" color:India

Top goalscorer in men's football

, the players with most goals scored in career from South Asia are:

By number of goals

#NameCareerGoalsCapsAvg/Game
1 Sunil Chhetri 2005–72112
2 Ali Ashfaq 2003–5279
3 Inivalappil Mani Vijayan 1989–20042966
4 Kasun Jayasuriya 2000–20092755
4 Baichung Bhutia 1995–20112782
6 Shabbir Ali1974–19842366
6 Jeje Lalpekhlua 2009–2354

By country

#NameCareerGoalsCapsAvg/Game
1 Sunil Chhetri 2005–72112
2 Ali Ashfaq 2003–5279
3 Kasun Jayasuriya 2000–20092755
4 Jahid Hasan Ameli 2005–1564
5 Nirajan Rayamajhi 2002–20101219
6 Muhammad Essa 2000–20091137
7 Chencho Gyeltshen 2011–1035