ThePremier League Asia Trophy (formerly theFA Premier League Asia Cup[1][2]) was abiennial pre-seasonassociation footballfriendly tournament inAsia. The two-day competition was inaugurated in 2003 and is one of twoPremier League-affiliated competitions to be hosted outside England, alongside thePremier League Summer Series in theUS.[3][4] It has taken place every other summer since then in order to avoid conflicting with theFIFA World Cup and theUEFA European Championship.[5] For sponsorship purposes, it was referred to as theBarclays Asia Trophy from 2007 until 2015,[6] after which the Premier League discontinued title sponsorship.[7]
The competition features three clubs that are members of the Premier League,[A] as well as a local team from the host country. It employs aknockout system in which the winners of the first matches advance to the final, while the losing teams take part in athird place playoff.[4][9] The tournament format was partly modified for the2017 edition, with no local team participating after the withdrawal ofShanghai SIPG.[10] A fourth Premier League club –Crystal Palace – agreed to take their place having avoided relegation and played alongsideLiverpool,Leicester City, andWest Bromwich Albion.[10] This marked the first time the tournament featured teams solely from the Premier League.[11][12]
Chelsea won the inaugural tournament in 2003, and finished victorious again in 2011. Seven other sides have won the Premier League Asia Trophy:Bolton Wanderers in 2005,Portsmouth in 2007,Tottenham Hotspur in 2009,Manchester City in 2013,Arsenal in 2015, Liverpool in 2017, andWolverhampton Wanderers in 2019. Manchester City is the most regular participant, having contested the tournament on three occasions.Thailand's under-23 national team are the only local Asian side to advance to the final of the contest. Hong Kong has hosted the tournament four times, more than any other city.
The FA Premier League Asia Cup, as it was originally known, was first organised in March 2003 byESPN STAR Sports and formally announced by the league's chairman,Dave Richards.[13] It was established as a result of "the increasing popularity of the Premier League in the continent".[5] Asia andOceania accounted for the league's largest audience during the2013–14 season with 339.5 million viewers. Moreover,China (52%),India (49%), andThailand (47%) had "the largest broadcast penetration" among international markets afterNigeria.[14] With the contest scheduled to take place three weeks before the start of theleague season, it is intended to serve as the last warm-up event for participating teams before they embark on competitive football.[13]
The next two tournaments saw the Premier League Asia Trophy return to Hong Kong. In2011, Chelsea participated in the competition a second time,[27] and regained the trophy by triumphing 2–0 againstAston Villa before a capacity crowd at theHong Kong Stadium.[28] Manchester City won the2013 event,[29] which was overshadowed by heavy rain causing the semifinal matches to be abbreviated to 80 minutes and leading to the degradation of the stadium'splaying surface.[30][31] The quality of the pitch was universally lambasted,[32] especially after several players were consequently injured while playing on it.[29][31][33]
The2015 edition was hosted bySingapore to honour the city-state's 50th anniversary ofindependence from Malaysia.[34][35] Arsenal claimed their first Premier League Asia Trophy, routing thehost country's Select XI side 4–0 behind aChuba Akpomhat-trick,[36] before defeating Everton 3–1 in the final. The event saw tournament attendance records broken for most people at a single match day (52,107) and the largest cumulative attendance across the two days (just short of 82,000).[37][38]
The2017 event featuredLiverpool,Leicester City,West Bromwich Albion, andCrystal Palace.[10] Due to the success of the Asia Trophy, the Premier League has considered establishing similar competitions in other continents to broaden their global presence.Richard Scudamore, the league's executive chairman, envisions Africa and the United States to be likely locations for such tournaments.[39][40]
^The three clubs are selected according to their position in the league table. One of the teams selected achieved the top five, the other team finished in sixth to tenth place, while the final team placed eleventh to fifteenth.[8]
^ab"Barclays Asia Trophy kicks off in Singapore". Barclays. 15 July 2015. Archived fromthe original on 5 May 2017. Retrieved5 May 2017.This is the fifth time that Barclays has sponsored the event, after tournaments in Hong Kong in 2007, Beijing in 2009 and Hong Kong again in 2011 and 2013, when Manchester City lifted the trophy.
^"Newcastle defeat Birmingham".BBC Sport. BBC. 24 July 2003.Archived from the original on 17 March 2016. Retrieved2 May 2017.They will now play in the final of the competition against either Chelsea o[r] Malaysia on Sunday while Birmingham will play in a third-place play off on Saturday.
^"Barclays Asia Trophy returns to Hong Kong". Barclays. 17 January 2013. Archived fromthe original on 3 May 2017. Retrieved3 May 2017.This is the sixth Asia Trophy, with the others having previously been held in Kuala Lumpur (2003), Bangkok (2005), Hong Kong (2007 and 2011) and Beijing (2009). Barclays is the title sponsor of the Asia Trophy for the fourth time.
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