By Victor Kanayo
World football governing body, FIFA, has awarded the Men’s U-20 World Cup in 2025 and that of the Women edition in 2026 to Chile and Poland respectively.
This was disclosed in a statement via the FIFA website.
Part of the statement reads, “FIFA Council met ahead of the FIFA Club World Cup 2023 semi-finals in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, with youth competitions an important item on the agenda, as Chile was unanimously appointed as the host of the FIFA U-20 World Cup 2025 and Poland as the host of the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup 2026”.
“Since 1962, Chile has organised FIFA events at the highest level, most recently the FIFA U-17 World Cup in 2015. The country’s organisational experience coupled with the passion of the Chilean fans will provide a fantastic setting for the stars of tomorrow,” said FIFA President Gianni Infantino.
“Poland is a country with a magnificent football tradition and hosted a memorable edition of the FIFA U-20 World Cup in 2019, in which emerging stars like Erling Haaland made a great impression. Hosting the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup 2026 will be a new milestone in Poland’s football history and one that will boost women’s football in the country and across the world.”
On given number of slots to various Confederations, FIFA said, “The slot allocation for both the FIFA U-20 World Cup 2025 and the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup 2026 are the same as each other and remain unchanged from the previous editions of both competitions: AFC: 4; CAF: 4; Concacaf: 4; CONMEBOL: 4; OFC: 2; UEFA: 5; host country: 1.
“As part of FIFA’s efforts to further professionalise the women’s game, the Council also approved the governing framework for a training compensation system for women’s football in order to encourage the development of youth players, protect the investment of the training clubs and contribute to the competitive balance and sustainability of women’s football.
“FIFA will subsequently draft the relevant regulations, and a task force will be established to finalise the technical details.
“With the objective of modernising the applicable regulatory framework for national dispute resolution chambers and to provide clarity and the necessary legal certainty with regard to their jurisdiction and structure, the FIFA Council approved the National Dispute Resolution Chamber Recognition Principles and its Annexe 1 (National Dispute Resolution Chamber Standard Regulations – 2023 edition.”
