Bangladesh will have very little hope of advancing into the AFC U-20 Women's Asian Cup after they were placed in Group H alongside former champions South Korea, hosts Laos and East Timor in the qualifying round on Monday.

A total of 33 nations, split into eight groups, will complete in the qualifying round with eight champions and three best runners-up teams advancing to the 12-team final, where hosts Thailand will be playing directly, from April 1 to 18, 2026.

The qualifying round of all eight groups will be played from August 2-10 in eight separate venues and Bangladesh team will start the campaign after completing the SAFF U-20 Women's Championship, scheduled for July 1-11 in Bangladesh.

After the draw Kuala Lumpur, Bangladesh Football Federation's women's committee chairman Mahfuza Akter Kiron had a meeting with head coach Peter Butler, who has been conducting training of both women's team as well as senior team, which will compete in Women's Asian Cup Qualifiers, scheduled for June 29 to July 5 in Myanmar.

"South Korea are former champions and it will be tough to get a result against them but we can try against Laos, who are a strong side too, to finish as runners-up and see if we can have a chance to go to the next round," Kiron told The Daily Star.

Bangladesh have played these qualifiers in 2006, 2011, 2011, 2019 and 2023. The women in red and green finish runners-up behind Iran in the 2023 while they finished either third or bottom of four or three-team groups in the remaining editions.