2015 FIFA U-20 World Cup

Host selection

Four FIFA member associations officially submitted their bids to host the 2015 FIFA U-20 World Cup by the deadline of 11 February 2011. On 3 March 2011, FIFA announced that the tournament would be held for the first time in New Zealand. This is the third FIFA competition staged in this country, after the 1999 FIFA U-17 World Championship and the 2008 FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup.

;Bidding member associations

• NZL New Zealand
• PER Peru
• TUN Tunisia
• WAL Wales

Venues

Auckland, Christchurch, Dunedin, Hamilton, New Plymouth, Wellington and Whangārei were the 7 cities chosen to host the competition.

Before the stadium announcements were made, Dunedin City council suggested in January 2013, that it would not bid to host matches at Forsyth Barr Stadium (also known as Otago Stadium) unless the costs (an estimated $1m) could be lowered. The stadium hosted seven matches there, the last of which being a Round of 16 game.

Qualified teams

In addition to host nation New Zealand, 23 nations qualified from six separate continental competitions.

: 1. Teams that made their debut. : 2. Serbia made their first U-20 World Cup appearance as an independent nation. They were chosen as the descendant of the now-defunct Yugoslavia, which qualified in 1979 and 1987.

Draw and schedule

The final draw was held on 10 February 2015, 17:30 local time, at the SkyCity Grand, Auckland. For the draw, the 24 teams were divided into four seeding pots:

• Pot 1: Hosts and continental champions of five confederations (except OFC)
• Pot 2: Remaining teams from AFC and CAF
• Pot 3: Remaining teams from CONCACAF and CONMEBOL
• Pot 4: Remaining teams from OFC and UEFA

As a basic principle, teams from the same confederation could not be drawn against each other at the group stage. As the CAF U-20 Championship was not completed at the time of the draw, a separate draw took place on 23 March 2015 in Dakar, Senegal, at the tournament's conclusion to determine the groups where the 2nd, 3rd and 4th placed CAF teams would play in, to ensure there was no manipulation of games in the qualifying tournament ensuring fairness to all qualified teams.

The schedule of the tournament was unveiled on 20 November 2013.

Match officials

A total of 21 referees, 6 support referees, and 42 assistant referees were selected for the tournament.

Squads

Main article: 2015 FIFA U-20 World Cup squads

The 24 squads were officially announced by FIFA on 21 May 2015. Each participating national association had to submit a final list of 21 players (three of whom must be goalkeepers) at least 10 days before the tournament started. These players were shortlisted from a provisional list of 35 players, including a minimum of four goalkeepers. All players must have been born on or after 1 January 1995. If a player listed in the final squad suffered a serious injury up until 24 hours before the kick-off of his team's first match, he could be replaced by a player from the provisional list with the approval of FIFA's medical and organising committees.

In July 2015, it was reported that the New Zealand squad had included an ineligible player, South African Deklan Wynne not having completed the requisite period of residence in New Zealand.

Group stage

The winners and runners-up of each group and the best four third-placed teams advanced to the round of 16. The rankings of teams in each group were determined as follows: | points obtained in all group matches; | goal difference in all group matches; | number of goals scored in all group matches; If two or more teams were equal on the basis of the above three criteria, their rankings were determined as follows: | points obtained in the group matches between the teams concerned; | goal difference in the group matches between the teams concerned; | number of goals scored in the group matches between the teams concerned; | drawing of lots by the FIFA Organising Committee. All times are local, New Zealand Standard Time (UTC+12).

Group A

Hyndman

Luchkevych Kovalenko Sobol Besyedin Hyndman Arriola Rubin

Patterson Stevens Brotherton Lewis

Group B

Escobar

Grubeck Buendía Aboagye Y. Yeboah

Group C

Silva
Santos

Rodrigues Vigário

Wagué Silva

Group D

Gbakle

Gutiérrez Mandić

Živković

Group E

Yahaya Judivan Boschilia Kalmár Forgács

Sokari Success A. Pereira

Jean Carlos L. Pereira

Group F

Stendera Prömel Mukhtar Stefaniak Shomurodov Urinboev Róchez Álvarez

Waqa Álvarez Akpoguma

Brandt Mukhtar Prömel Stark Urinboev Kosimov

Ranking of third-placed teams

The four best ranked third-placed teams also advanced to the round of 16. They were paired with the winners of groups A, B, C and D, according to a table published in Section 18 of the tournament regulations.

Knockout stage

In the knockout stage, if a match was level at the end of regular time (two periods of 45 minutes), extra time was played (two periods of 15 minutes) and followed, if necessary, by a penalty shoot-out to determine the winner. In the case of the third place match, as it was played just before the final, extra time was skipped and a penalty shoot-out took place if necessary. |11 June — New Plymouth| (pen.)|0 (5)||0 (4) |11 June — Hamilton||2||1 |11 June — Whangārei||0||2 |10 June — Auckland||1 (1)| (pen.)|1 (3) |10 June — Wellington||1||0 |10 June — Dunedin| |2||1 |10 June — Wellington||0||3 |11 June — Christchurch||1||0 |14 June — Hamilton| (pen.)|0 (3)||0 (1) |14 June — Wellington||0||1 |14 June — Auckland||0 (5)| (pen.)|0 (6) |14 June — Christchurch| (pen.)|1 (4)||1 (3) |17 June — Christchurch||5||0 |17 June — Auckland| |2||1 |20 June — Auckland||1| |2 |20 June — Auckland||1||3

;Combinations of matches in the Round of 16 The third-placed teams which advanced to the round of 16 were placed with the winners of groups A, B, C and D according to a table published in Section 18 of the tournament regulations.

Round of 16

Gbakle Doumbia

Talaber

Kharatin Habelok Luchkevych Sylla Niang

Martins

Lucão Danilo Jajá Gabriel Jesus Amaral Poyet Acosta Lemos

Quarter-finals

Lucão Danilo Gabriel Jesus Guzzo Silva Nuno Santos

Guindo Koné A. Traoré Samassékou Öztunalı Steinmann Brandt Stark

Payne Arriola Hyndman Zelalem Soñora Delgado Carter-Vickers Requejo Mandić Babić Grujić Živković Rajković Antonov Veljković Maksimović

Semi-finals

Marcos Guilherme Boschilia Jorge

Šaponjić

Third place match

Samassékou

Final

Maksimović

Awards

The following awards were given at the conclusion of the tournament. They were all sponsored by Adidas, except for the FIFA Fair Play Award.

Goalscorers

With five goals, Viktor Kovalenko and Bence Mervó were the top scorers in the tournament. In total, 154 goals were scored by 100 different players, with six of them credited as own goals.

;5 goals

• UKR Viktor Kovalenko
• HUN Bence Mervó

;4 goals

• GER Hany Mukhtar
• GER Marc Stendera
• MLI Adama Traoré
• POR André Silva

;3 goals

• GER Niklas Stark
• UZB Dostonbek Khamdamov

;2 goals

• ARG Ángel Correa
• BRA Andreas Pereira
• BRA Gabriel Boschilia
• BRA Judivan
• BRA Marcos Guilherme
• FIJ Iosefo Verevou
• GER Julian Brandt
• GER Grischa Prömel
• GHA Yaw Yeboah
• HON Bryan Róchez
• MLI Dieudonne Gbakle
• MLI Diadie Samassékou
• NGA Taiwo Awoniyi
• NGA Godwin Saviour
• NGA Isaac Success
• PAN Fidel Escobar
• POR Ivo Rodrigues
• POR Nuno Santos
• POR Gelson Martins
• SEN Mamadou Thiam
• SRB Nemanja Maksimović
• SRB Staniša Mandić
• SRB Ivan Šaponjić
• SRB Andrija Živković
• UKR Artem Besyedin
• USA Emerson Hyndman
• USA Rubio Rubin
• UZB Eldor Shomurodov
• UZB Zabikhillo Urinboev

;1 goal

• ARG Emiliano Buendía
• ARG Giovanni Simeone
• AUT Valentin Grubeck
• AUT Bernd Gschweidl
• BRA Danilo
• BRA Gabriel Jesus
• BRA Jean Carlos
• BRA Jorge
• BRA Léo Pereira
• COL Rafael Santos Borré
• COL Joao Rodríguez
• COL Alexis Zapata
• FIJ Saula Waqa
• GER Kevin Akpoguma
• GER Levin Öztunalı
• GER Marvin Stefaniak
• GHA Clifford Aboagye
• GHA Emmanuel Boateng
• GHA Benjamin Tetteh
• HON Kevin Álvarez
• HON Jhow Benavidez
• HUN Dávid Forgács
• HUN Zsolt Kalmár
• MLI Souleymane Coulibaly
• MLI Aboubacar Doumbia
• MLI Youssouf Koné
• MEX Kevin Gutiérrez
• MEX Hirving Lozano
• MYA Yan Naing Oo
• MYA Aung Thu
• NZL Noah Billingsley
• NZL Sam Brotherton
• NZL Stuart Holthusen
• NZL Clayton Lewis
• NZL Monty Patterson
• NZL Joel Stevens
• NGA Kingsley Sokari
• NGA Musa Yahaya
• PRK Choe Ju-song
• PAN Jhamal Rodríguez
• POR Raphael Guzzo
• POR João Vigário
• QAT Akram Afif
• SEN Moussa Koné
• SEN Sidy Sarr
• SEN Ibrahima Wadji
• SRB Sergej Milinković-Savić
• UKR Valeriy Luchkevych
• UKR Eduard Sobol
• UKR Roman Yaremchuk
• USA Paul Arriola
• USA Bradford Jamieson IV
• USA Maki Tall
• URU Franco Acosta
• URU Gastón Pereiro
• URU Mathías Suárez
• UZB Mirjamol Kosimov

;1 own goal

• GER Marvin Schwäbe (playing against Honduras)
• HON Kevin Álvarez (playing against Fiji)
• HUN Attila Talabér (playing against Serbia)
• PRK Min Hyo-song (playing against Brazil)
• PAN Chin Hormechea (playing against Austria)
• SEN Andelinou Correa (playing against Brazil) Source: FIFA.com

Final ranking

As per statistical convention in football, matches decided in extra time are counted as wins and losses, while matches decided by penalty shoot-outs are counted as draws.

Quarter-finals Round of 16 Group stage

Organization

Emblem and mascot

The official emblem of the tournament was unveiled on 20 November 2013. The official mascot, a black sheep named Wooliam, was unveiled on 30 November 2014.

Ticketing

Prior to being released for 'General sale' on 13 June 2014, registered footballers in New Zealand were given 'priority treatment' by allowing them the option to buy tickets from two months earlier.

In the first three months of tickets going on sale to residents, an estimated 25,000 were sold.

References

References

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