We haven’t really talked about this – there’s been a lot of other stuff going on! – but Tottenham Hotspur have two youngsters, striker Dane Scarlett and attacking midfielder Alfie Devine, participating with England in the U20 World Cup in Argentina. Indonesia was originally selected to host this tournament, but was replaced last month, apparently after widespread protests over Israel’s participation in the tournament (!!). (FIFA never really explained why they replaced Indonesia as hosts, only saying in a statement that it was “due to the current circumstances”, which is both LOL and also the most FIFA statement ever.)
Anyway, the tournament kicked off this week and England got off to a good start with a 1-0 group stage win over Tunisia on Monday. And guess who scored the winner? You guessed it, Dane Scarlett.
Here’s a YouTube highlight video, cue up to the Dane’s winner.
Great little header, that. Dane showed good instincts to crash the box and out-jumped his defender. A pretty nice ball in from Chelsea midfielder Harvey Vale too. Alfie Devine didn’t score or assist but went the full 90 in England’s first game.
Brazil are the big favorites to win the competition, probably more so now that they are practically playing on home soil, but both England and France are also considered contenders. England in particular have a strong squad and are in a decent enough group along with Tunisia, Uruguay and Iraq. The Young Lions won this competition in 2017 and you may also remember that Scarlett won the U19 Euros with England last summer.
And for the local contingent, the USA U20s also got off to a good start yesterday with a 3-0 win over Fiji in Group B. Next Friday they play Slovakia.
England’s next game is tomorrow against Uruguay. This match will be televised on Fox Sports 2 in the US; no TV coverage in England was provided, which kind of boggles the mind.
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