With the new season underway, the Canadian Soccer Association already has four national programs training in this month of January. The men’s U-23 (Olympic), women’s U-20 and women’s U-17 teams have all been in action this week while the men’s national team meets up this weekend to begin its 15-day January camp.
\u200bThe multiple camps are part of the Association’s renewed dedication to the youth programs. This year, Canada is scheduled to operate 10 national teams from the U-15 through national levels. Canada will also host two home games each for the men’s and women’s national programs in 2010.
Both the men’s national and men’s U-23 teams will actually overlap for an evening in Ft. Lauderdale. The U-23 team is at the tail-end of a weeklong camp which began 11 January. and culminated in a closed door game with the Honduran National Team on Friday 16 January. The men’s national team will train from 18-28 in Ft. Lauderdale, USA and then fly to Kingston, Jamaica on 29 January.
Canada faces Jamaica in an international friendly match on 31 January at the National Soccer Stadium. The Canada-Jamaica match will kick off at 18.00 local time.
On the women’s side, the U-17 team has been training at the Ontario Soccer Centre in Vaughan, ON while the U-20 team has been training at the University of South Florida in Tampa, FL. On Monday 18 January, the U-20 team will shift travel to Guatemala to take part in the 2010 CONCACAF Women’s Under-20 Championship.
Canada faces Costa Rica on 20 January, Cuba on 22 January and host Guatemala on 24 January in the group phase of the competition. The eight-team tournament runs through to the final on 30 January. The top-three teams from the competition will qualify for the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup Germany 2010.
The four camps will have featured 88 athletes, including Canadian U-20 Players of the Year Nana Attakora and Chelsea Stewart. Attakora is the lone player taking part in both the men’s U-23 and men’s full national camps. Stewart, meanwhile, is one of 23 players in the women’s U-20 camp fighting for one of the 20 final spots on the Canadian roster for next week’s CONCACAF championship.