Mexico, Trinidad, Costa Rica, Canada grouped for first round of CONCACAF U-20 Championship
Concacaf.com
1/15/2009 - NEW YORK –Mexico will face host Trinidad & Tobago, Costa Rica and Canada in the first round of the CONCACAF Under-20 Championship.
Thursday’s draw set the first-round opponents for the eight-team event, which will be played as a championship March 6-15 at a single venue for the first time since 1996. Trinidad and Mexico will be in Group B with the United States, El Salvador, Jamaica and either Honduras or St. Vincent & the Grenadines.
Honduras, which finished third in Central American qualifying, will face St. Vincent, runner-up from the Caribbean championship, in a two-leg playoff on dates yet-to-be determined.
Group B will be played at Marvin Lee Stadium in Macoya, Trinidad, on the outskirts of the capital of Port-of-Spain, while Group A will be played at Dwight Yorke Stadium in Bacolet on the island of Tobago. This is the fifth time Trinidad & Tobago has staged all or part of the CONCACAF U-20 finals. It staged consecutive championships in 1984 and 1986 and was host of one of two four-team groups in 1998 and 2001.
Match schedules have yet to be finalized, but should be announced within a week, CONCACAF General Secretary Chuck Blazer said.
The CONCACAF event will qualify four teams for the U-20 World Cup in Egypt September 23-October 16. The United States has qualified 11 times for FIFA’s premier youth event, including the last six. Mexico has qualified the second-most of any CONCACAF nation, 10 times.
Canada has advanced to the finals of the U-20 World Cup eight times, including each of the last four
