JASON DITULLIO PREPARES FOR U-20 WORLD CUP

[François]

JASON DITULLIO PREPARES FOR U-20 WORLD CUP
Impact midfielder is about to live "experience of a lifetime"

MONTREAL, February 6, 2003 — Impact midfielder Jason DiTullio is about to live, as he says, "the experience of a lifetime." On Saturday, he will join the under-20 Canadian national team as it will kick off the final stages of its preparation for the upcoming Youth World Cup.

FIFA’s U-20 World Cup will be hosted by the United Arab Emirates, March 25 to April 16. The Canadian squad, coached by Dale Mitchell and former Impact player Nick Dasovic, will train in Miami and Trinidad & Tobago over the next two weeks. The players will meet up again on March 3 for a five-day camp in British Columbia, before traveling to Turkey for their final preparation before the tournament.

DiTullio knows the next few weeks will be among the most exciting and beneficial of his young career.

"As a young player, you’re always looking to improve, and you want to acquire some experience that will allow you to achieve that. Hopefully, I’ll be able to use this experience to come back home and try to have an even bigger impact with the Impact this season," says the 19-year-old Montrealer, who received the Impact’s Unsung Hero Award in 2002.

"It truly is the experience of a lifetime," says Impact veteran midfielder and assistant coach Nick DeSantis, who played in the 1987 Youth World Cup in Chile. "He’s going to face great players, players he’ll see at the world stage over the next few years, with some of the top European clubs or at the World Cup. In 1987 in Chile, there were players like Boban, Suker, Andre Cruz and Prosinecki.

"You have to go there and savour every moment — the games, the atmosphere, the fans," adds DeSantis. "Canada has to go in with confidence, expecting to do well, but at the same time, you have to take in the experience."

Canada, one of 24 teams playing in the Youth World Cup, will be in the same group as Australia, Brazil and the Czech Republic. Although the top two teams in each of the six groups and the top four third-place finishers will advance to the knockout round of 16, DiTullio knows his team will face an uphill battle.

"It’s a tough group," he says. "Brazil is always one of the favourites to win the World Cup at the youth level. Australia has a lot of players who already play at a high level with European clubs. They have a good youth program, and so do the Czechs.

"But we’re going into the tournament with confidence, we know we can compete. We have a lot of experienced players, who also play abroad. It’ll be pretty much the same team we had in the qualifying tournament, except for a couple of changes," says DiTullio, who will be one of three Quebecers on the roster, along with Wyn Belotte, who plays for Norkopping, in Sweden, and 18-year-old local prospect Sita-Taty Matondo.

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SOURCE: bcomm

INFO: Stéphane Banfi tel. 514-328-3668 (ext. 27) or 910-4779

[Daniel]

Let's hope for Jason that it's not the "experience of a lifetime" and that he gets to play in the full World Cup or the Olympics.

****Off-topic****

What happens to story like these? Should they go in "Au Canada"? - maybe not this one but stories really talking about the Canadian team that are available only in English?

[François]

What we're trying to do in the english section is to post news on the team for people who don't speak french. That same news is in our «actualité» section and if people want to talk about it they can go either in the Impact or O Canada section...

[Invité]

[What about] stories really talking about the Canadian team that are available only in English?

[François]

If the demand is there, we just might deceide to have more than one section in english...