Myanmar to host three-nation football tournament

Indonesia, Malaysia and host Myanmar will feature the Grand Royal Challenge Cup 2006 football tournament to be held in Mandalay later this month, according to the Myanmar Football Federation (MFF) Tuesday.

The Challenge Cup, jointly sponsored by the MFF and a local company, will take place from Dec. 17 to 23 at the Bahtoo Stadium in the second largest city of Mandalay, 640 kilometers north of Yangon.

Four teams -- Indonesian national team, Malaysian U-23, Myanmar national team and Myanmar U-23 -- will compete at the tournament which will offer 15,000 US dollars for the champions and 7,500 dollars for the runners-up.

At the Grand Royal 2005 Challenge Cup football tournament held at the Thuwunna Youth Training Center here in November last year, four teams -- China's U-19, India's U-19, Bangladesh's selection ( with an average age between 23 and 25) and host Myanmar's U-23 -- competed at the tournament and the Myanmar U-23 team beat the Bangladesh selected team 2-1 after extra time in the final and won the trophy.

In the ASEAN Football Federation U-23 Youth Championship in Bangkok, Thailand in September 2005, Myanmar secured third place after beating Malaysia 5-3 in the penalty shoot-out.

With a glorious history in Asian soccer, Myanmar's national senior team had won five times ASEAN champions from 1965 to 1973 and claimed the Asian Games title in 1966 and 1970.

Source: Xinhua