Eritrea paired up with Ghana, Nigeria, & Burkina Faso

     The Eritrean national Under 17 team will take on
a very tough competition in March when they will be
playing in their first ever African Nations Cup of any
kind. In Togo the Redsea Camels will take on Ghana two
time champion and Nigeria one time champion while a
very strong Burkina Faso team will not be an easy
match. Eritrea will have it's hands full but again who
expected Eritrea to defeat one time African Champion
Egypt convincingly during the play off round.
     The final of the two-week championship will take
place on 24 March. Only the top two in each group
progress to the semi-finals.
     Even though some news organization have reported
that two finalists and the third-placed team qualify
for the Fifa World under-17 championship, Fifa has
added more teams this year as the tournament will have
24 teams instead of 16. The tournament is to be held
in South Korea, from 18 August to 9 September. Ghana
is the only country to have won the African under-17
Championship twice, having triumphed in 1995 and 1999.
Egypt, Nigeria, Cameroon and Gambia, meanwhile, have
all won the competition once. Also other facts you may
be interested in is that Ghana has won the under 17
world cup twice, Nigeria once and Burkina Faso has
taken third place in the world cup. So this will not
be a cake walk for Eritrea but with sheer
determination and great discipline there is no reason
why Eritrea will not be successful. Here are the
groupings for the 2007 under 17 African Nations Cup.

I would also like to recommend a committee be set up
in different continents to help support our young
athletes. When they travel to TOGO they should just
concentrate on playing the game as they will be facing
some tough teams. How about a fundraiser! Let us chip
in and help our National team.

Look at the following link for your viewing pleasure.

http://members.aol.com/__121b_QqCCshGvJZIPWBYh42j/lOGLPkLrPjji21nOMeb4s4E=

It is a great website initiated by an admirer.
Whomever it may be I want to say thank you for sharing
the success of our youth team.

Thanks to the Zambian Eritrean community as well as to
our embassy in the South Africa for the great
reception as witnessed in one of the videos, I think
it's time to put Eritrea on the map in world soccer.
These guys will also be tomorrow's hero's and we need
to stand by them through thick and thin. In 1999 I
wrote a wishful article on Dehai titled "Visions of
the World Cup" where I wished like every other
Eritrean to see our national team participate in South
Korea for the 2002 world cup. Five years later and at
the youth level, Eritrea has a great opportunity to
make it to the World Cup in South Korea.

Let us support! Let's come up with ways to create a
fund for our REDSEA BOYS.

E-mail me at mseium@yahoo.com with your ideas.
 
Below you can find the groupings for the African
nations cup.

Awet N'hafash,

Zelalemawi Zikri n'swatna

Mike Seium