“We’re ready to compete at the U20 Men’s C/ship” - Head Coach Wayne Dover

“We’re ready to compete at the U20 Men’s C/ship” – Head Coach Wayne Dover

Feb 07, 2020 Sports

After four weeks of training, Head Coach of the National U20 Men’s team Wayne Dover said Guyana is ready to compete at the Concacaf U20 Men’s Championship Qualifiers
scheduled for Nicaragua from February 15 – 23, 2020.

National U20 players during one of their training sessions at the GFF Training Facility, Providence, EBD.

Guyana has been drawn in Group A along with St. Vincent and The Grendadines, Montserrat, US Virgin Islands and host, Nicaragua.
“The National U-20 Team has been engaged in intense preparation for the CONCACAF Men’s U-20 World Cup Qualifiers this month and as such is ready to compete,” said Dover in an invited comment. “Despite the expected competitive nature of the group, I’m optimistic we could qualify out of this group.”
Guyana has had a total of 25 players engaged in weekly sessions at the GFF National Training Centre, Providence, with some joint sessions with the Senior Men’s National Team: “The training has been good since we started. There were a couple of sessions that were merged with the senior national team, and Head Coach Márcio Máximo took charge of those sessions with assistance from me and other U-20 staff members. There was a big effort to focus on team organization, how to attack, and how to defend.” Meanwhile, the final squad will be shortlisted to 20 players and named in the coming days.
The 2020 edition of the men’s world cup qualifying competition will be disputed in three stages, beginning with the qualifiers. For the qualifiers, the 17 participating teams (ranked from 17-41, according to the Concacaf Under-20 Ranking as of June 2019 were divided into three groups of four teams and one group of five teams.
The groups for the first-round qualifying stage are as follows (listed in the order drawn):
Group A: Nicaragua (ranked 20), Guyana (ranked 25), Saint Vincent and the Grenadines (ranked 28), Montserrat (ranked 41) and US Virgin Islands, ranked 33rd.
Group B: Dominican Republic (17th), Grenada (24th), Dominica (26th) and Anguilla (36th).
Group C: Curacao (19th), Guadeloupe (22nd), Belize (30th) and Saint Martin (32nd).
Group D: Bermuda (18th), Puerto Rico (21st), Cayman Islands (27th) and Barbados (31st).
After round-robin play, the top finisher in each of the groups will advance directly to the knockout stage of the competition (third round).
The second round of the competition will also be played in a groups format, between the top ranked 16 participating teams (according to the Concacaf Under-20 Rankingas of June 2019). For this round, the teams have been divided into four groups of four.
The groups for the second-round group stage are as follows (listed in the order drawn):
Group E: United States (1st), Costa Rica (5th), Jamaica (12th) and Saint Kitts and Nevis (15th).
Group F: Mexico (2nd), El Salvador (6th), Canada (9th) and Aruba (16th).
Group G: Panama (3rd), Haiti (8th), Trinidad and Tobago (10th) and Suriname (14th).
Group H: Honduras (4th), Cuba (7th), Guatemala (11th) and Antigua and Barbuda (13th).

After round robin play, the top three finishers of each group will advance to the knockout stage of the competition. The knockout stage of the competition (round of 16, quarterfinal, semifinal and final) will be played in June of 2020, at yet to be announced host country.
The match schedule for Guyana is as follows:
MATCH 1: 15th February @ 17:30hrs – Guyana vs Montserrat
MATCH 2: 17th February @ 17:30hrs – St. Vincent & The Grenadines vs Guyana
MATCH 3: 21st February @ 20:30hrs – US Virgin Islands vs Guyana
MATCH 4: 23rd February @ 20:30hrs – Nicaragua vs Guyana