Canada Soccer have announced their squad for the FIFA U-17 World Cup Brazil 2019, an exciting next step for Canada’s young footballers at the international level on their path to the Men’s National Team.
This will mark Canada’s 15th participation at a FIFA men’s youth tournament since 1979 and their first at the FIFA U-17 World Cup since 2011.
Canada will open against Brazil on Saturday 26 October and then face Angola on Tuesday 29 October and New Zealand on Friday 1 November.
All three of Canada’s group matches will be played at Estádio Walmir Campelo Bezerra in Brasilia and be broadcast live back home on TSN and RDS.
The Knockout Phase runs from November 5th to the Final November 17th.
Extended match day coverage will be featured across Canada Soccer’s digital channels including Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.
Fans are encouraged to follow Canada Soccer’s Men’s U-17 National Team every step of the way by using their social media handle, #canm17.
“It’s been a big year for our Men’s EXCEL Program with semi-final finishes at both the Concacaf Men’s Under-17 Championship and Concacaf Boys’ Under-15 Championship,” said Andrew Olivieri, Canada Soccer’s Men’s EXCEL U-14 to U-17 Program Director. “What an exciting time to not only be in Brazil, but also to play Brazil in the opening match.”
Young players in Canada are getting the chance to be part of upcoming International competition thanks to the FIFA U-17 World Cup Brazil 2019.
As one might hope it allows Canada Soccer’s Men’s EXCEL Program to get the chance to “target” potential future stars of the game.
Canada currently has 21 players who started their Canadian soccer trip coming from 18 different clubs across Canada, all of whom were all born in either 2002 or 2003.
This makes those players eligible for any future youth competitions taking the next step to the FIFA U-20 World Cup cycle in 2021 in addition to the Men’s Olympic Tournament being played in 2024.
Canada has been strongly working to grow its Men’s EXCEL Program working with the professional clubs in Canada as part of a NEX-PRO integration strategy.
This alone helps monitoring and tracking systems, periodising competition programs, and also aligning calendars ahead of the international competition in May.
Canada Soccer works have worked with Pro clubs, Provincial and Territorial members in their own environments, evaluating a large base of players with the clubs to develop players both on and off the field in hopes of making the National team.
Olivieri mentioned “A big part of our success has been the alignment across the country from our provinces to our professional academies and it has been wonderful how they have supported our program and helped us identify new talents. Then to top it all off with our integration camps, it has been an exciting year for the Men’s National Team Program.”
Prior to opening match in Argentina Canada trained for 12 days which included International matches against Mexico and Argentina.
Canada reached the semi-finals earlier in the year for the Concacaf Men’s Under-17 Championship after managing three impressive victories, one draw and two losses in six International matches.
