Nigeria, Ecuador and Australia to be our U17 World Cup group rivals in Brazil

The squad led by Sándor Preisinger earned its place at this showpiece event, which begins on 26th October, thanks to a fifth-place finish at the UEFA U17 European Championship in May in Ireland.

There were 24 team names in the hat for the U17 World Cup draw on Thursday, from which six groups of four teams were formed. The Hungarian national team awaited the draw from the fourth pot, which, according to the rules of FIFA, meant we would not not be drawn again any of our European rivals.

The teams were drawn by two former U17 World Cup stars, Brazilian Sonny Anderson and Nigerian Celestine Babayaro. Hungary were last to be drawn into group B, where they joined five-time world champions Nigeria as well as Ecuador and Australia.

The World Championships are hosted by four locations in three cities: the Estadio Bezerrao in Brasilia, the Estadio Olimpico in Estiaio and the Estadio de Serrinha in Estia, and the Estadio Kléber Andrade in Vitoria.

The Hungarian national team has so far taken part in a single official U17 World Championship, the first in 1985 in China (this was then a FIFA tournament for the Under-16 age group). On that occasion, we finished first in the group ahead of Brazil before losing to eventual winners Nigeria 3-1 in the quarter-finals.

All three of Hungary's group matches this year will be played in the Goiania Olympic Stadium, firstly on October 26 when they face Nigeria, on October 29 when Australia will provide the opposition and on November 1 when initial proceddings are concluded against Ecuador. Progressing to the knockout stages will be the top two teams in each group, plus the four third-placed teams with the most points.

"It is hard to say how strong the group we are in; this will become evident after we've fully analysed the opponents", coach Sándor Preisinger told mlsz.hu after the draw. "We are sure to be playing with national teams who are a frequent participant in the World Cup, so it's certain their youth teams will be serious contenders. Firstly, the U17 record of our first opponent, Nigeria, commands great respect, the African national team having won the World Cup several times in this age group. Our goal, of course, is to fight to reach the 2nd round of the tournament. I am happy to play all our group matches in the same stadium, so you can be more relaxed in the preparation stages, but we hope to see other stadia at a later stage in the tournament. Before it starts, there are still three team gatherings and in July I will be looking at the current status of the members of the squad, and see how the footballers are doing who didn't play in the European Championship, but upon whom we are counting. In August, we'll play in the Jezek tournament in the Czech Republic and in September we'll play a warm-up match against Croatia using the knowledge of how our prospective opponents will line up and we will try to finetune our tactics taking into account the group games ahead".

Our first group opponent, Nigeria, have five World Cup wins (1985, 1993, 2007, 2013, 2015) and have reached the finals on three other occasions (1987, 2001, 2009), but did not participate in the previous World Cup in 2017. Ecuador have appeared at the tournament on four previous occasions and reached the quarter-final stage in 1995 and 2015. Australia's best U17 World Cup performance is second place in 1999, and in 2011 and 2015 the southern-hemisphere country managed to progress to the second round of the competition.

2019 World Cup group draw:

Group A: Brazil, Canada, New Zealand, Angola
Group B: Nigeria, HUNGARY, Ecuador, Australia
Group C: South Korea, Haiti, France, Chile
Group D: USA, Senegal, Japan, Netherlands
Group E: Spain, Argentina, Tajikistan, Cameroon
Group F: Solomon Islands, Italy, Paraguay, Mexico