Who is still a chance of progressing in the Asian WCQ heading into the final day?

Having started back in November, the second round of Asian qualifiers for the 2026 FIFA World Cup comes to a conclusion on Tuesday. With the Asian Football Confederation now guaranteed eight spots in the expanded 48-team World Cup, the third round of Asian qualifiers will also see an increase to 18 hopefuls from the previous 12. With five places still up for grabs, who are the teams still in the running to keep their World Cup dream alive? Having reached the third round of Asian qualifiers in the previous two editions, Syria could have already secured a repeat of the feat only to lose to North Korea in injury-time last Thursday. It will still be interesting to see which of Iran and Uzbekistan finish top given they are currently level on 13 points, while there will also be a stronger seeding in the Asian Cup qualifiers for Turkmenistan and Hong Kong to battle for on Tuesday. With Iraq duly delivering on what was originally expected of them by finishing top of Group F, the more intriguing prospect was always which Southeast Asian prospect would be joining them in moving on to the third round. Jordan's progress continues a fine year for them after they had a dream run to the 2023 AFC Asian Cup final, while Tajikistan will now follow Pakistan in turning their focus to qualifying the continental tournament that will next take place in 2027.