FIFA’s head of youth tournaments, Roberto Grassi, believes that the first ever Women’s Under-20 World Cup with 24 teams, which the organization held between August 31 and September 22 in Colombia, was a success and increases the development opportunities for female footballers.
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“It’s the first FIFA women’s youth tournament with 24 teams. This is part of FIFA’s strategy, because we have to have more opportunities for players to participate in international tournaments,” Grassi told EFE in an interview at the El Campín stadium in Bogotá, where North Korea beat Japan 1-0 in the final of the tournament on Sunday.
The FIFA representative explained that in addition to increasing the number of teams, the International Federation of Association Football also plans to make these youth tournaments, which are usually held every two years, more frequent.
Netherlands vs. United States in the Women’s World Cup.
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“From 2025, we will be playing with the U-17s every year, because the vision of the president (of FIFA, Gianni Infantino) is to give teams and players many opportunities to win matches at international level,” he explained.
For this reason, Grassi considered that “this tournament was proof that it is possible, that it is better, because we had competitive matches, 24 teams that have excited Colombia, they have played well.”
Crowds in stadiums and exciting atmospheres On six of the tournament’s matchdays, there were more than 30,000 fans in the stands at the El Campín stadium in Bogotá, Pascual Guerrero in Cali, and Atanasio Girardot in Medellín. In Cali, for the quarter-final match between the Netherlands and Colombia, 37,382 fans attended the stadium, a record attendance for a match at a U-20 Women’s World Cup.
Women’s U-20 World Cup Semi-Finalists
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“The fans at this tournament in Colombia were wonderful: there were kids, women and families, people who wanted to enjoy football and a day of celebration. This is very important for us because youth tournaments are football festivals, it is not a competition where there is pressure to win, these are tournaments to celebrate football and the celebration of football,” he said.
In the final, with two Asian teams and little support in the host country, more than 32,000 fans filled the stands at El Campín. There were other matches with much fewer attendees, but in which the Colombians also saw a very high level of play.
Colombian women’s team celebrates after beating Cameroon 1-0 at El Campín.
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“There was a high level of competition in the tournament, the players are very well prepared physically and tactically. We have teams that play football like the best teams in the world. They were very competitive and had the spirit to win,” added Grassi.
Video Support makes its debut The video review system (FSV) made its debut at the World Cup in Colombia, a test that FIFA will use to assess whether it is viable in the future. According to FIFA, this system is a “simplified version” of the VAR that was already tested in May during the FIFA/Blue Stars Youth Championship in Zurich in May. Unlike VAR, the FVS does not have “specialised video match officials”, which is why it does not automatically check all dubious plays in matches.
In this sense, it is the team coaches who must call the referees, using a green card that they must show to the fourth official. Two requests for review can be made per match when they consider that there has been a clear error. This proposal comes after FIFA received requests from countries that wish to provide technological support to their referees in a more economical way than the VAR, an instrument that is already used in more than 200 competitions in 65 federations.
“The feedback is good now, but for us it is still in testing. It is the first time we have used the ‘video support’ system for a world tournament, we are going to test it further. The FIFA referees department will analyse the result, the feedback from the teams,” said Grassi, who believes that this test will give them better information for the future.
Finally, the FIFA official highlighted Colombia as the host country: “We had a tournament without any organisational problems.”
“We have a very committed host, with a lot of support and efforts from the cities. We had four stadiums that were left with world-class pitches, training fields and perfect hotels,” he concluded about what remains for the Andean country after the tournament.
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