Chile Win the Toulon Tournament

June 13th, 2009 | by: Daryl |

This goal from Gerson Martinez was enough to beat France 1-0 and win the Toulon Under-21 Tournament for Chile.

If you’re unfamiliar with The Toulon Tournament, it’s basically a non-FIFA U-21 tournament with invitational teams. Despite (or maybe because of) it’s unofficial status, teams still take it pretty seriously.

Great week for Chilean football, as the senior team won both its World Cup qualifiers are now sits second in CONMEBOL World Cup qualifying. (If you’re interested in blogging about La Roja here on WCB, then give this a read.)

Argentina finished third in Toulon, beating the Netherlands in the third place playoff with this free kick from Diego Buonanotte:

Buonanotte (of River Plate) and Martinez (of San Luis) finished the tourney as joint top scorers with four each.

The more official UEFA Under-21 European Championship kicks off on Monday, June 15th.

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SP

daryl, i think the reason that the teams and players take toulon seriously is because its really important for scouting reasons, as in which players will get a look in their respective international u21 teams. i’m basing that off of last year when toulon was right before the olympics so the usa team was made up of players on the fringes of the olympic team so they all had something to prove.