May 16th – 25th, Bangkok Thailand
In a little under a week’s time, the AFC U20 Futsal Championship kicks off in Bangkok. Twenty-one teams from as far afield as Australia and Afghanistan will be competing for the Asian crown, and two places in the Youth Olympics next year in Argentina.
Sam Twigg is part of the 16 man Thailand squad, from which 14 will be chosen this Friday to represent Thailand in the competition. All their games are scheduled for the Bangkok Futsal Centre, on the outskirts of town (near the airport).
Thailand is in a pool of six teams, and play one pool game each evening from Tuesday 16 – Saturday 20th. Sunday is a rest day, and the quarter-finals will be held on Monday 22nd. The Semis, Bronze final, and Grand final are on Wednesday 24th, Thursday 25th and Friday 26th respectively.
Thailand have a tough pool and launch their campaign against traditional rivals Malaysia on Tuesday night. That’s followed by Bahrain, Brunei, Afganistan and Iraq, with the top two teams advancing to the quarterfinals. All Thailand’s pool games are at 19:00pm (UTC+7), or midnight NZ time. If the training matches are anything to go by, they will be streamed on the FutsalThailandOfficial Facebook page, and available to watch after that. Judging from the media interest, it most likely will be televised and available through mainstream channels as well.
This is the inaugural U20 championship, and hence the form-books offer at best an educated guess as to who will emerge on top. On the basis that the hosts are the defending mens champions, they’ve got a good chance of being there on Thursday or Friday night. But as we all know in Futsal, anything can happen, and usually does.
Here’s the full draw:
