The time has come for Qantas Joeys on the world stage

All of the planning, nurturing, preparation and hard work that has gone into the past two years of getting the Qantas Joeys to this point will finally be realised and put into action when they run out against Côte d'Ivoire at Estadio Guadalajara on Monday night (Mexico time) in their opening match of the FIFA U-17 World Cup Mexico 2011.

All of the planning, nurturing, preparation and hard work that has gone into the past two years of getting the Qantas Joeys to this point will finally be realised and put into action when they run out against Côte d'Ivoire at Estadio Guadalajara on Monday night (Mexico time) in their opening match of the FIFA U-17 World Cup Mexico 2011.

In what will be Australia-s eleventh appearance at the FIFA U-17 World Cup, and first since 2005, this crop of Qantas Joeys are ready to announce themselves on the world stage, beginning with a tough first up assignment against Côte d'Ivoire.

The Qantas Joeys have spent the past 12 days acclimatising to the Mexican climate, in which they trained at Pachuca-s Club De Futbol complex and played two lead up matches against Canada and Uruguay, winning both 2-1.

On top of the positive results against Canada and Uruguay, Qantas Joeys Head Coach Jan Versleijen also has a fully fit and healthy list of players to choose from for his side-s opening Group F match.

Versleijen is pleased with the way his players have adapted to Mexico-s high altitude and the artificial grass surfaces, which is the surface the Qantas Joeys will play their opening two games on.

The squad had a familiarisation session on the artificial Estadio Guadalajara pitch a day out from the game, Versleijen pointing out that the week the squad had in Pachuca prior to arriving in Guadalajara was extremely beneficial leading into the World Cup.

“It-s an additional challenge playing in Mexico. Everybody knows about the altitude, that-s why we went for one week to Pachuca where we were able to train on artificial fields and also grass fields,” Versleijen said.

“The preparation up to now has been very good, we don-t have any injured players which is also good, and coming to Guadalajara, it is a bit different from Pachuca because the altitude is not as high, which is an advantage when you come from a higher altitude.”

According to many who observed the CAF U-17 Championship (the World Cup qualifying tournament in Africa), Côte d'Ivoire were the standouts and Versleijen is wary of the threat the Africans can pose.

“Côte d'Ivoire is a very interesting team. They have the African attributes of being technical, fast and strong, but they also have the European discipline and I think that tomorrow it will be a very competitive game,” Versleijen said.

Having done his homework on the Qantas Joeys- first up opponents, Versleijen can see a number of similarities in the style both his team and Côte d'Ivoire try to play, and it is a commonality that he believes will bring out a highly entertaining and intriguing spectacle.

“Of course we studied their (Côte d'Ivoire-s) qualifying games in Africa and also got some information from the warm up games they played here in Mexico, so I guess we are well prepared, and I can already promise to everybody watching tomorrow that it will be a football game,” Versleijen said.

“We are a team who likes to play out from the back, we are a team who likes to play combination football. If possible we like to dominate, dictate and that-s the same thing that I could see from Côte d'Ivoire, so aside from the score, I think football will be the winner tomorrow.”

Speaking about his side-s chances in the lead up to the tournament, Côte d'Ivoire Head Coach Jean-Marc Nobillo stated, “there are big surprises in football and we can be one of them”, but come game time tomorrow, the Joeys will be determined to make sure they are the ones springing the surprises.

Kick-Off is at 6:00pm local time (9.00am AEST) and the game can be seen LIVE on SBS TV. The match will follow the other Group F encounter between Brazil and Denmark.

FIFA U-17 World Cup Mexico 2011 - Group F Qantas Joeys v Côte d'Ivoire Monday 20 June 2011, Estadio Guadalajara Kick-Off: 6:00pm local time (9:00am AEST, Tuesday 21 June) Referee: Raymond Bogule (Jamaica)

Qantas Joeys squad: 1.Paul IZZO (gk), 2.Jake MONACO, 3.Connor CHAPMAN (c), 4.Tom KING, 5.Corey BROWN, 6.Yianni PERKATIS, 7.Hernan ESPINDOLA, 8.Mitch COOPER, 9.Dylan TOMBIDES, 10.Jesse MAKAROUNAS, 11.Luke REMINGTON, 14.Milos DEGENEK, 15.Anthony PROIA, 16.Stefan MAUK, 17.Jacob MELLING, 18.Daniel SADAKA (gk), 19.Mitchell OXBORROW, 20.Nicholas ANSELL, 21.Riley WOODCOCK

Côte d'Ivoire squad: 1.Yored KONATE (gk), 2.Jean-Eudes AHOLOU, 3.Mory KONE, 4.Ibrahima BAH, 5.Jean THOME, 6.Dorian KOUAME, 7.Jean KOUASSI, 8.Victorien ANGBAN, 9.Daniel SOUNGOLE, 10.Wilfried GNAHORE, 11.Lionel LAGO, 12.Guy BEDI, 13.Jeremy KIMMANKON, 14.Mehoue TRAORE, 15.Drissa DIARRASSOUBA, 16.Severin DJE YAO (gk), 17.Losseni KARAMOKO, 18.Ibrahim COULIBALY, 19.Souleymane COULIBALY, 20.Banvo ANDERSON, 21.Aboubakar OUATTARA (gk)

FIFA U-17 World Cup Mexico 2011 - Group F 1. Australia 2. Côte d'Ivoire 3. Brazil 4. Denmark