The 2021 U-20 Africa Cup of Nations was the 16th edition (23rd edition if editions of the tournament without hosts are included), the biennial international youth football tournament organized by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) for players aged 20 and below. In September 2018, it was decided that the tournament would be hosted by Mauritania. This would be the first edition of the Africa U-20 Cup of Nations to be expanded to 12 teams instead of eight. The top four teams of the tournament would have normally qualified for the 2021 FIFA U-20 World Cup in Indonesia as the CAF representatives. However, FIFA decided to cancel the tournament on 24 December 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The defending champions Mali failed to qualify. Ghana won their fourth title by defeating debutant Uganda in the final.
Qualification
At the end of the qualification phase, eleven teams will join the hosts Mauritania.
Player eligibility Players born 1 January 2001 or later are eligible to participate in the competition.
Qualified teams The following 12 teams qualified for the group stages.
Note: All appearance statistics count only those since the introduction of the competition in 1991.
Team ZoneAppearance Previous best performance (hosts) West A Zone 1st North Zone 5th (1997) North Zone 1st West A Zone 3rd (2007) West B Zone 12th (1993, 1999, 2009) West B Zone 4th (2003) Central-East Zone 1st Central-East Zone 1st Central Zone 1st Central Zone 10th (1995) South Zone 1st South Zone 1st
Venues Nouakchott Stade Olympique Stade Cheikha Ould Boïdiya Capacity: 20,000 Capacity: 8,200 Nouadhibou Stade Municipal de Nouadhibou Capacity: 10,300
Squads
Draw The group stage draw was held on 25 January 2021, 11:00 AM WAT (UTC+1), at the Hilton Hotel in Cameroon. The twelve teams were drawn into three groups of four teams. The hosts, Mauritania, were seeded in Group A and allocated to position A1, with Ghana and Burkina Faso, the only teams among the 12 who participated in the last edition of the CAN Total U20, drawn into B1 & C1 positions. All the other teams were in the same level and were distributed over the three groups.
Hosts Pot 1 Pot 2 (A1)
Match officials A total of 16 referees and 18 assistant referees were appointed for the tournament.
Referees Abdelaziz Bouh (Mauritania) Jean Ouattara (Burkina Faso) Blaise Yuven Ngwa (Cameroon) Samuel Uwikunda (Rwanda) Ibrahim Kalilou Traoré (Ivory Coast) Messie Jessie Nkounkou Mvoutou (Congo) Celso Alvacao (Mozambique) Mutaz Ibrahim (Libya) Pierre Atcho (Gabon) Mahmood Ali Mahmood Ismail (Sudan) Mohamed Ali Moussa (Niger) Souleiman Ahmed Djama (Djibouti) Adalbert Diouf (Senegal) Mahamat Alhadji Allaou (Chad) Akhona Makalima (South Africa) Mehrez Melki (Tunisia)
Assistant Referees Hamedine Diba (Mauritania) Meriem Chedad (Mauritania) Samuel Kuria (Kenya) Abbes Akram Zerhouni (Algeria) Michael Conteh (Sierra Leone) Modibo Samake (Mali) Tigle Gizaw Belachew (Ethiopia) Thomas Kusosa (Zimbabwe) Rodrigue Menye Mpele (Cameroon) Jospin Luckner Malonga (Central African Republic) Abdoulaye Sylla (Guinea) Clemence Kanduku (Malawi) Kwasi Brobbey (Ghana) Frank John Komba (Tanzania) Aymen Ismail (Tunisia) Eric Ayimavo (Benin) Youssef Wahid Elbosaty (Egypt) Adia Cisse (Senegal)
Group stage
The top two teams of each group advance to the quarter finals along with the two best 3rd placed teams.
Tiebreakers
Teams are ranked according to points (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss), and if tied on points, the following tiebreaking criteria are applied, in the order given, to determine the rankings (Regulations Article 71): Points in head-to-head matches among tied teams; Goal difference in head-to-head matches among tied teams; Goals scored in head-to-head matches among tied teams; If more than two teams are tied, and after applying all head-to-head criteria above, a subset of teams are still tied, all head-to-head criteria above are reapplied exclusively to this subset of teams; Goal difference in all group matches; Goals scored in all group matches; Drawing of lots.
All times are in WAT (UTC+1).
Group A
Group B
Group C
Ranking of third-placed teams
Knockout stage
Quarter finals
Semi finals
Third place
Final
Winners
Awards The following awards were given at the conclusion of the tournament: Player of the Tournament Abdul Fatawu IssahakuTop Scorer Derrick KakoozaBest Goalkeeper Ibrahim DanladBest Coach Morley Byekwaso ()CAF Fair Play Team
Team of the Tournament Source:
Coach: Morley Byekwaso Goalkeeper Defenders Midfielders Forwards Ibrahim Danlad Flory Yangao Blondon Meyapya Lamin Jawara Aziz Kayondo El Mehdi Moubarik Lamarana Jallow Chiheb Labidi Abdul Fatawu Derrick Kakooza Joffrey Bazié
Goalscorers
Final standings Per statistical convention in football, matches decided in extra time are counted as wins and losses, while matches decided by a penalty shoot-out are counted as draws.
| colspan="11"| Eliminated in the quarter-finals
| colspan="11"| Eliminated in group stage
References