United States joined Costa Rica, Honduras and Mexico in qualifying for the FIFA Under-17 World Cup to be held in India later this year following the team’s latest victory at the CONCACAF U-17 Championship in Panama City.
The Americans beat Cuba 6-2 in its Classification Stage group match and sealed a berth for the prestigious tournament in India as well as booked a spot in continental final after finishing top of its group.
Mexico, Costa Rica and Honduras have already sealed their places for the U-17 World Cup. CONCACAF, the continental football Confederation of North, Central America and the Caribbeans, has got a quota of four for the U-17 World Cup.
Fifteen countries have already qualified for the October 6-28 Under-17 World Cup to be held in six cities across India.
Iran, Iraq, Japan and North Korea, besides hosts India have qualified from Asia, while Brazil, Chile, Colombia and Paraguay have done so from South America. New Zealand and New Caledonia will represent Oceania.
The qualifying tournament for Europe is underway (May 3-19) in Croatia while the African qualifiers will be held from May 14 to 28 in Gabon. Five countries will qualify from Europe while four will make the grade from Africa.
Welcoming the teams, Tournament Director for the Local Organising Committee Javier Ceppi said, “The teams of CONCACAF promise to be very strong and will delight the fans in India.
“Mexico is a two-time U-17 World Cup champion (2005 and 2011), made it to the final in 2013 and semi-final in 2015.
Costa Rica got to the quarter-finals in 2015 and most of the players of their celebrated Brazil 2014 run, including star Real Madrid goalkeeper Keylor Navas, started their careers in an U-17 World Cup,” Ceppi said.
“USA came to India last year for the five Nations Tournament and is a very strong team. Honduras has featured regularly in World Cups. India 2017 is getting a line-up of very strong participants, so we expect fans to give a good response when tickets go on sale on 16th May.”
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