The decision, announced during the AFC meeting in Manila, was made by the AFC Competitions Committee chaired by Dr Tran Quoc Tuan, and saw Qatar overcome rival bids from Uzbekistan, Saudi Arabia and Iran.

The 16-nation biennial competition, which was launched as the AFC under 22 Championship last year in Oman, where Iraq were the inaugural winners, has also been renamed as the AFC U-23 Championship.

Every alternate edition will also as the continental Olympics qualifier, with three Rio 2016 qualification places to be available in Qatar, although an exact date for the event is yet to be announced.

Following the ongoing focus on Qatar's controversial success in being awarded the 2022 FIFA World Cup, this marks another example of the country's growing status as a location for major events, with it also likely to be a key test on the road to 2022.

It also marks yet another major sporting event to be held in Qatar following the awarding the 2019 World Athletics Championships to the nation earlier this month, with championships in shortcourse swimming, handball and boxing also taking place there in 2015.

The decision sees yet another major sporting event be awarded to Qatar on the road to the 2022 FIFA World Cup ©Getty Images





Elsewhere during the meeting today, AFC President Shaikh Salman bin Ebrahim Al Khalifa praised the work put in by the members of the Competitions Committee, before predicting how changes made will have a positive impact on the sport in Asia.

Everyone is looking forward to Asia's biggest competition - the AFC Asian Cup - taking place in Australia for the first time in January, he claimed, before expressing confidence that the Oceanic nation will prove to be excellent hosts.

The members approved the regulations for the 2016 editions of the AFC under 16 and under 19 Championships as well as the AFC Champions League and the AFC Cup.

It was also decided to introduce two rounds of playoff matches to decide the final eight teams for the 2019 AFC Asian Cup final round of qualifiers.