With just a week to go until the opening match, the Cambodian national team have been training in preparation for the 2023 AFF Under 23 Championship.
Seen as second in importance at this age bracket only to the SEA Games, this will be the first major tournament presided over by Felix Dalmas since his return to the top job.
You can read our interview with Felix here.
2023 AFF Under 23 Championship
Held intermittently since the first championship in 2005, this will mark just the 4th time that the tournament has been completed. So far it has been won once each by Thailand, Indonesia and most recently Vietnam.
Last year the tournament was hosted extremely successfully by Cambodia, whilst this year’s tournament will take place just next door in Thailand.
Ten members of the ASEAN Football Federation will take part, with Singapore having withdrawn due to footballing reasons.
This will see two groups of three and one group of four. All group winners qualify for the semi-finals, alongside the best runner-up.
What are Cambodia’s chances?
Drawn against Thailand Brunei and Myanmar their best hope is to finish as the best second placed team, which will mean needing to beat Myanmar and score as many goals as possible agains a weak Brunei side.
Alas Myanmar proved to be a bit of a bogeyman team for Cambodia at at the last SEA Games, essentially knocking them out on home turf.
You can read about the Cambodia vs Myanmar match here.
But, this is not the same Cambodia team, nor is it the same coach, with many hoping for great things from Felix Dalmas. It should well be noted that the previous best performance by Cambodia came with their 4th placed finish in 2019, under, you guessed it Felx Dalmas.
In this respects anything less than a semi-final berth will be seen as a failure.
This article is adapted from BPVE, (https://bpve.com/) reported and edited from the great team – Cambodia Sports Review. (https://www.cambodiasportsreview.com/)
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