Nigeria’s Falconets have been drawn in Group C and will face France, Canada and South Korea at this year’s U-20 Women’s World Cup in Costa Rica.
The draw was held today (Thursday) at the Teatro Nacional de Costa Rica in San José.
The competition will run from 10th to 28th August in the cities of Alajuela and San Jose.
The 16 qualified teams were seeded based on their performances in the five previous World Cups.
Also, five bonus points were added to each of the confederation’s current champions that won the respective qualifying tournament.
Africa’s other representative Ghana are in Group D and will take on the United States, Japan and Netherlands.
At the 2018 in France, the Falconets crashed out in the quarter-finals after losing 2-1 to finalists Spain.
Their best achievement at the U-20 Women’s World Cup was at the 2010 and 2014 editions where they finished as runners-up.
At the 2014 tournament, Asisat Oshoala emerged top scorer with seven goals and won the Most Valuable Player award.
To qualify for this year’s tournament, the Falconets hammered Central African Republic 11-0 on aggregate in the second round.
In the third round, they beat Congo 4-0 away and had a walkover in the return leg in Nigeria.
They faced Cameroon in the fourth stage of the qualifiers and after a goalless first Leg in Yaoundé, the Falconets won the second leg 3-0.
And in the fifth and final round, they overcame Senegal 7-2 on aggregate.
The 2022 FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup will be the 10th edition.
Costa Rica would have hosted the 2020 edition but it was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It will be the second time that Costa Rica host a FIFA tournament after the 2014 FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup.
Costa Rica and Panama were originally selected as co-hosts of the 2020 edition on 20 December 2019, before the withdrawal of Panama leaving Costa Rica as the sole hosts.
On 17 November 2020, FIFA announced that the 2020 edition of the tournament would be cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, Costa Rica were appointed as hosts of the next edition of the tournament in 2022.
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COMMENTS
Group of death but I trust this team based on the technical crew.
Best of luck girls.
In truth, the group is not as insurmountable for the Flamingos. They are not unfamiliar with these teams at this level and as a matter of fact, the omens are in thier favour to make it out of the group.
What has to be remembered is that this tournament still has a relatively low number of teams: 16 teams across just 4 groups.
As a result, all the groups are quite tough and highly competitive. Take, for instance, Ghana’s group which comprises of Holland, Japan and the United States of America – all formidable teams at this level with only the top two teams scaling through to the knockout phase.
Many major tournaments these days tend to have a minimum 6 groups for 24 teams. I forsee this Under-20 women’s world cup being expanded in the not too distant future.
As for Nigeria’s group, the Flamingos have battled these 3 teams combined a 6 times, returning 4 wins and 2 loses.
We met Canada 3 times with 2 wins and 1 loss. France have defeated us in our only encounter with them while we have returned 2 wins from our 2 duels against South Korea.
So, based on precedent, our most potent threat in the group is France. And we have every reason to be weary of the Fabulous French ladies.
They breezed through their under 19 Uefa Championship (qualifier) tournament undefeated with 13 goals against the likes of Holland, Norway, Spain and Germany.
France are indeed hot tournament favourites and Danjuma’s damsels will definitely have their work cut out against this juggernauts.
As for Canada, they scored a whooping 29 goals in their first 4 games in the Concacaf Under 20 women’s championships en route qualifying for this world cup.
Don’t be easily blown away though as these goals were against El Salvador, Trinidad and Tobago and Cayman Islands. Against more formidable opponents Mexico, Panama and Puerto Rico, they scored only 3 goals and lost to Mexico.
Still, Canada are expected to present a stern test for the Flamingos – a game Nigeria definitely cannot afford to lose.
As for South Korea, they scored 13 goals across 6 games in the Asian Under-19 championship against decent opponents to qualify for this championship.
The Korean ladies are definitely in it to win it and should never be seen as pushovers.
All of these just make for fascinating encounters for the Flamingos. How they start will dictate how far they will advance in this championship.
Every match should have to be seen and approached as a cup final.
Should Danjuma’s damsels navigate the group stages successfully, then they can expect to go far in the tournament.
Correction : * Falconets *
@deo, thanks for the insights. Time to organize quality tune-up matches for the falconets in the likes of The Netherlands, Japan and Canada to have a feel of what our opponents are capable of. The coaching crew should also watch and analyze the clips of the qualifiers of our group opponents to decipher their tactics and work out ways of neutralizing them. There is no time to waste. NFF, over to you. We must win this trophy this time around!
*in the likes of The Netherlands, USA and Japan…..
If it was super eagles that was pitched against this same countries. I can be calculating ….a draw with Canada a draw with France and a draw with south Korea. 3 points.but for this flamingo I can garanteeee 4 or 5points.
I can garanteeee 5 points for the falconet . Assuming it is super eagles I can garanteeee 3 points . Dey wil draw all