Soccer fever returns to the world's largest continent on Saturday when the most ambitious Asian Cup on record gets underway in Thailand.
Over the next 23 days, 16 teams representing a combined total of more than 1.5 billion people will do battle for Asia's most coveted soccer prize, with reputations and national pride also at stake.
Four countries will host a major tournament the first time in the sport's history, with fans from Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam given a rare glimpse of the likes of Celtic's Shunsuke Nakamura, Newcastle United's Mark Viduka, Liverpool's Harry Kewell and Frankfurt's Naohiro Takahara.
Organisers admit having so many hosts has been a headache, although there will be few complaints from fans in four countries deeply passionate about soccer.
The Asian Cup also features an outsider for the first time after Australia ditched Oceania in search of bigger tournaments and tougher opposition.
The Australians are determined to show their impressive run at last year's World Cup in Germany was no fluke, and that some good soccer from their cast of European-based players can bring them a debut title.
However, having won three of the last four tournaments, few will dare to write off Japan, even though the current side is a shadow of their 2002 World Cup team.
Japan's hopes of winning their third-straight title rest with Takahara and Nakamura and a little less tinkering from Bosnian coach Ivica Osim, who has selected 51 players since last year's World Cup.
Badly hit
Two-time champions South Korea have been badly hit by injuries and the absence of English Premier League trio Park Ji-sung (Manchester United), Lee Young-pyo (Tottenham Hotspur) and Seol Ki-hyeon (Reading) makes their bid to end a 47-year drought all the more tricky. 
A fitting choice to host the opening match is soccer-mad Thailand, where players are receiving pop-star receptions and the Kingdom's police force is bracing itself for a three-week illegal betting frenzy.
Groupings:
Group A:  Australia, Iraq, Oman, Thailand; Group B:  Japan, Qatar, UAE, Vietnam; Group C: China, Iran, Malaysia, Uzbekistan; Group D: Bahrain, Indonesia, South Korea, Saudi Arabia.