Saturday, January 15, 2011

South America selects its representatives.

Conmebol (South American Football Confederation) has four places in every FIFA Sub-20 World Cup, but being this year's cup in Colombia, there are only three places left. These places are selectec through the South American Youth Championship.


The 2011 South American Youth Championship will take place in Perú between 16th January and 6th Febraury and, besides the four places for the FIFA Sub-20 World Cup Colombia 2011, it will grand two places for the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, England. The ten national teams member of Conmebol (Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru, Uruguay and Venezuela) will contest the championship and the qualifications.


The tournament divides the participant teams in two groups: For this year's championship the groups will be as follows: 


                                    Peru                                              Brasil           
                                    Argentina                                      Paraguay
                                    Uruguay                                        Colombia
                                    Chile                                             Ecuador
                                    Venezuela                                    Bolivia


The teams will play a single all-against-all round in their respective group and each group's first three will pass to a six-team stage where they will play again all against all. At the end of this second stage, the best-ranked will be the champion and so on. This rank is also taken into account for the qualifications. If Colombia ranks among the first four the fifth will qualify for the  FIFA Sub-20 World Cup Colombia 2011.


For all FIFA's championships, held all-around the world, a team that wins scores 3 points, those that tie score 1 point and the one that loses scores none. In the South American Youth Championships when two or more team tie in points, in order to break the tie, the goals are taken into account. If the draw remains the scores of the games played among the tied teams are considered. If the draw still remains the places will be determined by drawing lots. It could be tossed head or tail.


So, the next 6th February the world will find out which ones are the next four national teams qualified for the FIFA Sub-20 World Cup Colombia 2011. I will let you know!





Monday, January 10, 2011

2011 began with 11 national teams qualified!


In this new year of FIFA U-20 World Cup there are eleven national teams ready for the Colombian edition due to the tournaments played by two of the six football confederations that make up FIFA (Association Football International Federation).

The first one was the Asian Football Confederation which held the 2010 AFC U-19 Championship between Febrary 2009 and October 2010, whose finals were played in China. The resulting qualified teams are, from champion to fourth; North Korea, Australia, South Korea and Saudi Arabia. Although Australia is not an Asian country but from Oceania continent, the AFC approved its move from the Ocean Football Confederation (OFC), of which it was a founding member, to improve the standard of Australian football and give the national team a fairer chance of qualifying for World Cups, as well as providing access to the AFC Champion League.

The second confederation which already selected its national teams for the FIFA U-20 World Cup Colombia 2011 is the UEFA that celebrated the Union of European Football Association U-19 Football Championship between September 2009 and July 2010 in France, qualifying six teams: from champion to sixth; France, Spain, England, Croatia, Portugal and Austria. 

The next confederation which will hold its qualifying tournament is Conmebol (South american Football Confederation) through the 2011 South American Youth Championship to be performed between January 16th and February 6th, 2011 in Peru. This tournament grants four places for the FIFA U-20 World Cup but this time one of them belongs to Colombia as the host country.

The Oceania Football Confederation (OFC), the Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (Concacaf) and the Confederation of African Football (CAF) will hold their qualifying tournaments between March and April 2011 in New Zealand, Guatemala and Libya, respectively.

In summary, 11 out of 24 national teams are, so far, qualified for the FIFA U-20 World Cup Colombia 2011. They are, in alphabetical order:


Australia           Austria             Colombia            Croatia             England             France                  North Korea     Portugal           Spain                   Saudi Arabia   South Korea               
   
Once all the qualified teams will be know in next April, the championship draw will take place in that month in Cartagena, Colombia.




Tuesday, January 4, 2011

FIFA U-20 World Cup Colombia 2011

After the FIFA World Cup, the FIFA U-20 World Cup is the most important association football championship which is performed by male players under 20 years old, every two years, since 1977. 2011 tournament will take place in Colombia, South America.

At the FIFA’s executive committee meeting held in Sydney, Australia, on the 26th of May 2008 Colombia beat the only other candidate Venezuela, by withdrawing from the race with Brazil to host the 2014 FIFA World Cup. The Colombian Football Federation unveiled the budget for conducting the FIFA U-20 World Cup Colombia 2011, which is 150 billion Colombian Pesos (USD 75 million aprox.).The completion of the event could provide Colombia with a launch pad to become a possible host for the 2026 FIFA World Cup.

The FIFA U-20 World Cup Colombia 2011 games will be played between July 29th  and August 20th in the cities of Bogotá, Medellin, Cali, Barranquilla, Cartagena, Manizales, Armenia and Pereira. The opening game would be held at the Estadio Metropolitano Roberto Meléndez, in Barranquilla, with Estadio El Campín hosting the Final match.

The championship will be competed by 32 U-20 national teams from the six world confederations (UEFA, Conmebol, Concacaf, AFC, CAF and OFC), divided into six groups. The two best-ranked teams in each group will qualify to the eighth-finals together with the four best thirds. That makes 16 teams in 8 games. Winners go to quarter-finals and so on to semi-finals and final.

In 18 editions of the FIFA U-20 World Cup Argentina has won 6, Brazil 4, Portugal 2, Soviet Union, Germany, Yugoslavia, Spain and Ghana 1. The FIFA U-20 World Cup has launched international football stars such as Diego Maradona, Oleg Salenk, Adriano, Javier Saviola, Lionel Messi and Sergio Agüero.