Just as the 2018 FIFA World Cup is winding down, U.S. Soccer announced Monday that it will host the 2018 Para Seven-a-Side Invitational in San Diego.
The tournament will be held July 19-21 at the Elite Athlete Training Center in Chula Vista. The competition features the Paralympic National Teams of Australia, Canada and the United States.
The seven-a-side is a variant of soccer where each team is made up of seven players playing 30 minutes halves, instead of the usual 11 players and 45 minutes halves.
“Both Canada and Australia will provide a very different style of opponent, and this will be key to the preparation of the squad moving forward,” U.S. Paralympic National Team coach Stuart Sharp said. “The players are feeling confident about what is in front of them in the coming months and are eager to get out on the field in what will be the first international competition for most of them since we finished fifth at last year’s World Championships in Argentina.”
The U.S. will open the tournament July 19 against Australia with a rest day in between before facing Canada on July 21. This is the first time the Para team has hosted multiple international teams for a competition at home and Sharp said he will use the event as a preparation for the 2018 International Federation of Cerebral Palsy Football Copa America, which takes place Oct. 12-21 in Natal, Brazil.
“Organizing these games at this time will be extremely beneficial for us to test ourselves against international competition ahead of the Copa America in October,” Sharp said. “We’ve recruited quite a few new players and have created a completely different game model from what we’ve been using across the past four years.”
This will also be the first time the U.S. will play international matches under new ICFPF eligibility rules, which changed the make up the U.S. Para team and helped it rise in ranking from eighth to fourth in the world.
Fans and spectators are welcome to watch the matches at the EATC facility.
Here’s the 2018 Tri-Nation International Challenge Schedule
- USA vs. Australia 5 p.m. July 19
- Australia vs. Canada 5 p.m. July 20
- USA vs. Canada 5 p.m. July 21
