The 2018 OFC U-16 Championship was the 18th edition of the OFC U-16/U-17 Championship, the biennial international youth

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kick (football), kicking a football (ball), ball to score a goal (sports), goal. Unqualified, football (word), the word ''football'' generally means the form of football t ...

championship organised by the

Oceania Football Confederation The Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) is one of the six continental confederations of international association football. The OFC has 13 members, 11 of which are full members and two which are associate members not affiliated with FIFA. It ...

(OFC) for the men's under-16/under-17 national teams of Oceania. The qualifying stage was held in

Tonga Tonga, officially the Kingdom of Tonga, is an island country in Polynesia, part of Oceania. The country has 171 islands, of which 45 are inhabited. Its total surface area is about , scattered over in the southern Pacific Ocean. accordin ...

between 14 and 20 July 2018, and the final tournament was held in the

Solomon Islands Solomon Islands, also known simply as the Solomons,John Prados, ''Islands of Destiny'', Dutton Caliber, 2012, p,20 and passim is an island country consisting of six major islands and over 1000 smaller islands in Melanesia, part of Oceania, t ...

between 9–22 September 2018. Before the last tournament the age limit was reduced by a year to 16 years of age. However the last tournament remained the name U-17 Championship. For this tournament, the name has changed to U-16 Championship. So players who want to participate in the tournament needed to be born on or after 1 January 2002. At an OFC Executive Committee meeting held at its

Auckland Auckland ( ; ) is a large metropolitan city in the North Island of New Zealand. It has an urban population of about It is located in the greater Auckland Region, the area governed by Auckland Council, which includes outlying rural areas and ...

headquarters in November 2013 the competition format was modified. The competition was brought forward a year and the age limit was lowered to 16 years of age. The changes were made in order to allow the winner of the competition plenty of time for preparation and player development for upcoming World Cups at Under 17 level. In March 2015, FIFA decided that the OFC gets two slots at every FIFA U-20 and U-17 World Cup. So the top two teams of the tournament qualified for the

2019 FIFA U-17 World Cup The 2019 FIFA U-17 World Cup was the 18th edition of the FIFA U-17 World Cup, the biennial international men's youth association football, football championship contested by the under-17 national teams of the member associations of FIFA. It was ...

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

as the OFC representatives.

New Zealand New Zealand () is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and List of islands of New Zealand, over 600 smaller islands. It is the List of isla ...

, the defending champions, won the title for the eighth time, and qualified together with runners-up

Format

The tournament structure is as follows: *Qualifying stage: The four teams from the "developing associations" (

American Samoa American Samoa is an Territories of the United States, unincorporated and unorganized territory of the United States located in the Polynesia region of the Pacific Ocean, South Pacific Ocean. Centered on , it is southeast of the island count ...

Cook Islands The Cook Islands is an island country in Polynesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It consists of 15 islands whose total land area is approximately . The Cook Islands' Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) covers of ocean. Avarua is its ...

Samoa Samoa, officially the Independent State of Samoa and known until 1997 as Western Samoa, is an island country in Polynesia, part of Oceania, in the South Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main islands (Savai'i and Upolu), two smaller, inhabited ...

and

) play in the qualifying stage. The winner of the

round-robin tournament A round-robin tournament or all-play-all tournament is a competition format in which each contestant meets every other participant, usually in turn.''Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged'' (1971, G. & ...

qualify for the final tournament. *Final tournament: A total of eight teams (

Fiji Fiji, officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists of an archipelago of more than 330 islands—of which about ...

New Caledonia New Caledonia ( ; ) is a group of islands in the southwest Pacific Ocean, southwest of Vanuatu and east of Australia. Located from Metropolitan France, it forms a Overseas France#Sui generis collectivity, ''sui generis'' collectivity of t ...

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea, officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is an island country in Oceania that comprises the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and offshore islands in Melanesia, a region of the southwestern Pacific Ocean n ...

Tahiti Tahiti (; Tahitian language, Tahitian , ; ) is the largest island of the Windward Islands (Society Islands), Windward group of the Society Islands in French Polynesia, an overseas collectivity of France. It is located in the central part of t ...

Vanuatu Vanuatu ( or ; ), officially the Republic of Vanuatu (; ), is an island country in Melanesia located in the South Pacific Ocean. The archipelago, which is of volcanic origin, is east of northern Australia, northeast of New Caledonia, east o ...

, and the qualifying stage winner) play in the final tournament. For the group stage, they are divided into two groups of four teams. The top two teams of each group advance to the knockout stage (semi-finals and final) to decide the winner of the OFC U-16 Championship and the two teams that qualify for the

FIFA U-17 World Cup The FIFA U-17 World Cup, founded as the FIFA U-16 World Championship, later changed to U-17 in 1991 and to its current name in 2007, is the annual world championship of association football for male players under the age of 17 organized by ''Fé ...

. The draw for the tournament was held on 2 February 2018 at the OFC Headquarters in

. In both the qualifying stage and the final tournament, the hosts (Tonga and Solomon Islands) were assigned to position A1 in the draw, while the remaining teams were drawn into the other positions without any seeding.

Teams

All 11

FIFA The Fédération Internationale de Football Association (), more commonly known by its acronym FIFA ( ), is the international self-regulatory governing body of association football, beach soccer, and futsal. It was founded on 21 May 1904 to o ...

-affiliated national teams from the OFC entered the tournament. ''Note: All appearance statistics include those in the qualifying stage (since 2017).''

Venues

The hosts of the qualifying stage and final tournament were announced by OFC on 31 October 2017. *The qualifying stage was played at the Loto-Tonga Soka Centre in

Nukuʻalofa Nukualofa ( , ) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Tonga. It is located on the north coast of the island of Tongatapu, in the country's southernmost island group. History First western records of Nukualofa On 10 June 1777, British ...

. *The final tournament was played at the

Lawson Tama Stadium Lawson Tama Stadium is a multi-purpose stadium in Honiara, Solomon Islands. It is used mostly for association football, football matches. The stadium is unique as the stand is built into the hillside so there is no official capacity but no more ...

Honiara Honiara () is the capital and largest city of Solomon Islands, situated on the northwestern coast of Guadalcanal. , it had a population of 92,344 people. The city is served by Honiara International Airport and the seaport of Point Cruz, and lies ...

Squads

Players born on or after 1 January 2002 are eligible to compete in the tournament. Each team can name a maximum of 20 players.

Qualifying stage

The winner advance to the final tournament (group stage). All times are local, TOT (

UTC+13 UTC+13:00 is an identifier for a time offset from UTC of +13:00. Because it does not contain any land in the Northern Hemisphere, this time zone is exclusive to the Southern Hemisphere. As standard time (year-round) ''Principal cities: Apia, ...

). ---- ----

Group stage

The top two teams of each group advance to the semi-finals. All times are local, SBT ( UTC+11).

Group A

---- ----

Group B

---- ----

Knockout stage

Bracket

Semi-finals

Winners qualify for

. ----

Third place match

Final

Winners

Goalscorers

In the qualifying stage, In the final tournament, In total,

Awards

The ''Golden Ball Award'' is awarded to the most outstanding player of the tournament. The ''Golden Glove Award'' is awarded to the best goalkeeper of the tournament. The ''Golden Boot Award'' is awarded to the top scorer of the tournament. The ''Fair Play Award'' is awarded to the team with the best disciplinary record at the tournament.

Qualified teams for FIFA U-17 World Cup

The following two teams from OFC qualify for the

. :

¹ Bold indicates champions for that year. ''Italic'' indicates hosts for that year.

Age fraud controversy

The

, which originally finished second, were found by the OFC to have deliberately fielded overage player Chris Satu during the tournament and would forfeit all results and their place in the 2019 FIFA U-17 World Cup. The decision was reviewed under appeal from the

Solomon Islands Football Federation The Solomon Islands Football Federation is a member of the Oceania Football Confederation. The Solomon Islands national football team made history when they made it to the final Oceania stages of the 2006 World Cup Qualification against Australi ...

. The OFC Executive Committee announced on 3 May 2019 that Solomon Islands would keep their spot for the FIFA U-17 World Cup on the grounds that the federation had not knowingly broken the rules as Satu had a government issued passport showing his eligibility. On 11 December 2019, it was found that Solomon Islands' player Maxwell Keana played in five games with a "false birth certificate and passport to improperly seek eligibility" for the competition. As a result, the

was sanctioned and the Oceania Football Confederation banned the

from entering a team in the 2023 OFC U-17 Championship.

Notes

References

External links

2018 OFC U-16 Championship
oceaniafootball.com
News > 2018 OFC U-16 Championship
, oceaniafootball.com {{DEFAULTSORT:OFC U-16 Championship 2018

2018 Events January * January 1 – Bulgaria takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, after the Estonian presidency. * January 4 – SPLM-IO rebels loyal to Chan Garang Lual start a raid against Juba, capital of ...

U-16 Championship U-16 Championship 2018 in Solomon Islands sport International association football competitions hosted by the Solomon Islands September 2018 sports events in the Solomon Islands 2019 FIFA U-17 World Cup qualification