Argentina will play in the “group of death” after the reissue of the South American Sub 20 draw

The Directorate of Competitions and Operations of Conmebol The zones were drawn again for the group stage of the South American U-20 this Friday after the change of headquarters and Argentina became part of the famous “death group”; their opponents in Group B will be Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador and Bolivia.

The tournament, agreed to be organized in Peru, underwent a change of venue days after the arrest in Lima of Agustin Lozanopresident of the Peruvian Football Federation (FPF), within the framework of an investigation into accusations of money laundering and fraud.

Venezuela was the chosen destination for the competition that will begin on January 23, 2025 and will end on February 16. With the participation of the ten teams belonging to the member associations of CONMEBOL, the Sudamericano will award four tickets to the 2025 FIFA U20 World Cup to be held in Chile.

For the draw, the Venezuelan team was seeded as the host country, and Brazil was seeded as the current champion. After luck played its part, the two zones ended up distributed as follows:

Group A: Venezuela, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile and Peru. Group B: Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, Argentina and Bolivia.

The difficulty in the drawn group becomes clear when the qualifiers for the Indonesian World Cup in 2023 are remembered; Four of the five that had the privilege of playing in the World Cup are in zone B -Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Ecuador (the remaining one was Uruguay)-.

The team led by Diego Placenteafter the departure of Javier Mascherano to Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami, will have to face this new reality and prepare the team with the advantage of having already coached in the South American Championship, in which they qualified for the World Cup, and in the Sub World Cup. -17 from Indonesia.

Some of the names that are rumored to be part of the squad that the Argentine technical director will present are: Claudio Echeverri (River/Manchester City), Franco Mastantuono (River), Agustín Ruberto (River), Ian Subiabre (River), Santiago Hidalgo (Independiente ), Lautaro Millán (Independiente), Julio Soler (Lanús), Agustín Ladstatter (San Lorenzo), Santiago Sosa (San Lorenzo), Teo Rodríguez (San Lorenzo), Dylan Aquino (Lanús) and Santino Andino (Godoy Cruz).

It will be played in two phases: Preliminary Phase (Group Phase) and Final Phase. The six teams classified from the preliminary phase will participate in this phase, with the same game system (all against all). All phases will be played in a single round of matches.

The preliminary phase is played by 10 teams, distributed into 2 groups of 5 teams each.

The teams that occupy the first three positions in each group will qualify for the final hexagonal (Final Phase). This “mini league” will determine which teams will get their ticket to Chile 2025.