CAIRO: After 51 matches between 24 teams, Ghana’s Black Satellites and Brazil’s Samba dancers will go head to head tonight at Cairo Stadium vying for the U-20 World Cup trophy.
The match and closing ceremony will be attended by Prime Minister Ahmed Nazif and FIFA President Joseph Blatter.
While Brazil will be going for their fifth title in the history of the tournament, Ghana will be aiming to break the European and South American monopoly and win the first title for Africa after four previous failed attempts by African teams.
Both teams were among the few who showed consistency from the start of the tournament; Brazil inaugurated their campaign with a 5-0 trashing of Costa Rica then held Czech Republic to a goalless draw before crushing Australia 3-1.
In round of 16, a tough Uruguay couldn t stop the Brazilian march to the final who then grabbed a difficult 2-1 victory from a tactically strong German side before beating Costa Rica 1-0 in the semi-final.
The Ghanaians on the other hand cruised through their group beating Uzbekistan and England 2-1 and 4-0 before drawing Uruguay 2-2. In round of 16, Ghana won an all-African encounter against South Africa 2-1 during the extra time before beating South Korea 3-2; in the semi-final they beat Hungary 3-2.
Both teams showed high offensive abilities during their matches while players like Dominic Adiyiah and Andre Ayew of Ghana and Alan Kardec and Alex Teixeira of Brazil excelled throughout the matches tipping themselves as the stars of the tournament.
However, defensive abilities and goalkeeping remain untested.
Both teams enjoy great offensive tendencies and our match will be very entertaining for the fans to watch, said Rogerio Lourenco, Brazil s coach.
Both sides met three times during FIFA youth tournaments; In 1993 s U-20 World Cup Brazil edged Ghana 2-1 to win their third title in a match that witnessed Dida as Brazil s goalkeeper; in 1995 s U-17 World Cup in Ecuador, Ghana achieved a 3-2 victory over the Brazilians in the final; in 1997 s U-17 World Cup final in Cairo, a young Ronaldinho led his side to a 2-1 victory.
While this is the third final for Ghana in the U-20 World Cup after two failed attempts in 1993 against Brazil and 2001 against Argentina, Brazil will play its seventh, five from which it emerged victorious in 1983, 1985, 1993 and 2003.
While the South Americans have dominated the tournament with Brazil winning the 2003 title and Argentina winning those of 2001, 2005 and 2007, Africans failed to come through after close calls by Ghana and Nigeria in 1993 and 2005.
Brazil only needs two goals to reach 200 as the highest scoring team in the history of U-20 World Cup. On the other hand, Adiyiah of Ghana has a great chance of winning the Golden Shoe award as the tournament s top scorer, four goals ahead of his nearest competitor.
On the other hand, Hungary and Costa Rica will be competing for the third place and bronze medals when they play ahead of the final at Cairo Stadium, in the first match ever between the two countries in all FIFA s competitions.
Hungary bounced back from a humiliating 3-0 defeat against Honduras to beat UAE and South Africa 2-0 and 4-0, before showing strong nerves against Czech Republic winning through penalty kicks after a 2-2 draw.
In the quarterfinals, the Hungarians surprised Italy with a 3-2 victory in an epic match in which the score changed three times in the last 10 minutes of extra time only to lose to Ghana in the semi-final.
Costa Rica, on the other hand, qualified as best thirds from their group after losing to Brazil 5-0 and Czech Republic 3-2 before beating Australia 3-0.
However, the North Americans sent hosts Egypt out of the tournament beating them 2-0 in the presence of 80,000 fans before grabbing a last minute winner against UAE in the quarterfinals. They lost, however, to Brazil by one goal.
It is the first time for both sides to play on such level in the tournament and if Cost Rica wins it will be the first CONCACAF side to finish third.
Both teams enjoy the highest record of yellow cards received in the tournament with 21 for Hungary and 20 for Costa Rica.
Breaking Records
Egypt 2009 is just one goal away of breaking the record of highest number of scored goals after equalizing Malaysia 1997 s record of 165 goals; also if six goals are scored in the two remaining matches Egypt would break the average of goals scored per match, 3.28, held by Qatar 1995.
The tournament is also about to break the record of fans attendance held by Canada 2007 of 1,195,239 in 52 matches with an average of 22,985 per match; Egypt 2009 has recorded 1,159,958 with an average of 23,199 with two matches remaining.
On another note, the tournament broke Netherlands 2005 s record of number of cards shown (241 yellow cards, 16 red cards) scoring 261 yellow cards and 27 red cards with an average of 5.22 yellow cards per game and 0.54 red card.
