Ghana’s Women National Under-20 football team nicknamed the Black Princesses will make their 6th World Cup appearance, which will be staged in San José, Costa Rica.
Nurturing the brightest talents in international Women’s football and taking place biennially, the FIFA U20 Women’s World Cup sees 16 nations compete against each other for the ultimate prize. With continental qualification pathways leading to a thrilling finals’ event, the competition has seen four past champions; USA, Germany, Japan and Korea DPR.
Black Princesses has made five World Cup appearances, making the debut in Germany 2010 spearheaded by coach Kuku Dadzie. Robert Sackey took the mantle in 2011 and qualified the Princesses to Japan 2012 and Canada 2014. Coach Yusif Basigi took the Black Princess job in September 2017 and qualified the Ghana female U-20 to France 2018. However, the Black Princesses have never gone past the group stage in the World Cup.
The Black Princesses qualified alongside their West Africa counterpart Nigeria for the global showpiece. The female U20 had a walk over from the first game, Mauritania female U20 failed to honor their double legged game.
Ghana traveled to Zambia on the 4th December 2021 to play a 0-0 stalemate at Lusaka. Black Princess beat Zambia by a goal to nil at Cape Coast Sports Stadium to progress to the next stage.
Uganda invited the Black Princess for the first leg encounter in Kampala, which ended 2-1 in favor of the Princess. Cape Coast Stadium was the center of attraction for the second leg encounter. Ghana’s female U-20 stood firmly to justify that they are too strong for the Ugandans, and went ahead to beat them by 5 goals to nil. Making it 7-1 on aggregate.
In the fourth round of qualifiers, the Ethiopians hosted the Black Princess. They thrashed the home side by 3 goals to nil. In the reverse fixture, the Princess harmed the Ethiopians by 2-1.
After staging the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup in 2014, Costa Rica will once again welcome the best teams in the world – this time for the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup 2022. The tournament, which was originally planned for 2020 and intended to have Panama as co-hosts, had to be postponed due to the COVID pandemic. Costa Rica were then named sole hosts of this rescheduled global showpiece, which will run from 10th to 28th August 2022.
Preparations for the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup 2022 have taken an exciting step forward today after the match schedule and date for the Official draw for the tournament was announced by FIFA and the Local Organizing Committee (LOC).
Stadium, Estadii Alejandro Morera Soto in Alajuela and Stadium Estadio Nacional in San José will be a venue of attraction for Costa Rica in 2022.
Brent Kojo Amenuvor
Ewurama Acheampoma