FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup: China replaces North Korea

China is all set to participate in the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup to be held in India later this year.

Published : Mar 16, 2022 16:59 IST

REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE: The U-17 World Cup will be held from October 11 to 30 in India.

China is all set to participate in the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup to be held in India later this year, the Asian Football Confederation announced on Wednesday. It replaces North Korea.

“The AFC notes the inability of the DPR Korea Football Association's national age-group teams to compete in the FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup India 2022 and FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup Costa Rica 2022 respectively,” AFC said on Wednesday.

“China PR, who finished third in the AFC U-16 Women’s Championship Thailand 2019, will join Japan and host India as the AFC’s three representatives at the FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup India 2022 scheduled to take place from October 11 to 30.”

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According to the rules, in the case of withdrawals from FIFA competitions, the next highest-ranked team from the respective qualification events will represent Asia. Australia, which finished fourth in AFC U-19 Women's Championship in 2019, will replace North Korea and join Japan and South Korea as Asia’s three representatives at the 2022 FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup in Costa Rica.

India was originally selected to host the 2020 FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup but the tournament was cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, India will host next edition of the tournament in October this year.

Asia will be represented by host country and two other countries in the 16-team tournament. New Zealand has also qualified as representative of Oceania Football Confederation. The qualifying tournaments of other continents are either going on or yet to take place.