2021 Malaysia Cup group stage

The draw for the group stage was held on 15 September 2021, 14:00 MYT (UTC+8), at the Bukit Jalil, in Kuala Lumpur.^[2]

The 16 teams were drawn into four groups of four. For the draw, the teams were seeded into four pots based on the following principles.

• Pot 1 contained the Super League winners, and another three teams at the top four based on league positions. Pot 1 includes the top 4 teams from the Super League.
• Pot 2 with those place 5th to 8th from the Super League.
• Pot 3 with those placed 9th to 11th from Super League, together with the 1st placed team from the Premier League.
• Pot 4 with those placed 2th to 5th from Premier League.

The schedule of each matchday is as follows:

Below are the participating teams grouped by their seeding pot. They include:

• Top 11 teams from the Super League and Top 5 teams from Premier League which enter in this stage.

In each group, teams played against each other home-and-away in a round-robin format. The group winners and runners-up advanced to the quarter-finals.

Teams were ranked according to points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss), and if tied on points, the following tiebreaking criteria were applied, in the order given, to determine the rankings.

1. Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
2. Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
3. Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
4. Away goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams;
5. If more than two teams were tied, and after applying all head-to-head criteria above, a subset of teams were still tied, all head-to-head criteria above was reapplied exclusively to this subset of teams;
6. Goal difference in all group matches;
7. Goals scored in all group matches;
8. Away goals scored in all group matches;
9. Wins in all group matches;
10. Away wins in all group matches;
11. Disciplinary points (red card = 3 points, yellow card = 1 point, expulsion for two yellow cards in one match = 3 points);