U-17 World Cup: Impressive Performance of African Representatives (28.08.2007)
Three of the four teams engaged qualified for the second round of the competition.
It has been a pass mark for African representatives in the Under-17 World Cup tournament currently taking place in South Korea. Ghana, Nigeria and Tunisia qualified for the knock-out stage of the competition whereas; Togo was the only African representative to have been eliminated at the group stage of the competition.
Nigeria and Tunisia sailed through in flying colours winning all three group matches to top Group D and E, respectively with nine points each. Ghana came second in Group F with six points. Nigeria was the first African team to qualify for the second round when they crushed Haiti 4-1 to open the way for Ghana and Tunisia the next day. The Black Starlets of Ghana beat Colombia 2-1 last Sunday 26 August, to clinch the last Group F qualification ticket for
the second round with six points. Meanwhile, the Carthage Eaglets of Tunisia beat Tajikistan 1-0 to maintain their perfect record at the under-17 World Cup.
Ghana will face Brazil in the next round on Wednesday 29 August. Meanwhile the African champions, Nigeria will on Thursday lock horns with Colombia which finished third in Group F. On that same Thursday, Tunisia will be slugging it out with France.
The CAF African U-17 Championship took place from 10 to 24 March 2007 in Togo. With two wins from their first two games in Group B, Ghana and eventual champions Nigeria were first to book their passage to the semi-finals and consequently the FIFA U-17 World Cup. Hosts Togo finished Group A on top, one point ahead of second-place Tunisia, who piped South Africa in an extremely tight fight to claim the last remaining African place at Korea 2007.
