Spain

Confederation – UEFA (Europe)

FIFA Code – ESP

Nickname(s) – La Rojita (The Little Red One); La Furia Roja (The Red Fury)

Tournament History

Before the 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup, Spain had made eight appearances in this youth tournament. Their best performance was in 1991, 2003 and 2007 where they had finished as a runner-up in each time. The 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup is their ninth appearances in this tournament history, after missing in the previous three editions.

Year	Hosts	Final Status
*1991*	*Italy*	*Runner-Up*
1995	Ecuador	Group Stage
1997	Egypt	Third Place
1999	New Zealand	Group Stage
2001	Trinidad and Tobago	Group Stage
*2003*	*Finland*	*Runner-Up*
*2007*	*South Korea*	*Runner-Up*
2009	Nigeria	Third Place

(Note: The best performance(s) is/are marked in bold and italic)

Present Status (for 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup)

i) The Journey: Spain has qualified for the upcoming 2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup through the 2017 UEFA European Under-17 Championship, where they had become the champion. In the final of that competition, Spain had beaten England in the penalty shoot-out [Spain 2 (4) – England 2 (1)].

ii) Head Coach: Santiago Denia (Nationality – Spain) has been appointed as a head coach of this team since 2010. Denia follows the ‘tiki-taka’ style along with 4-3-3 or 4-3-2-1 formation.

2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup: Team Previews - Group D 3 — Santiago Denia (Image Source: Google)

iii) Full Squad: (Goalkeepers) Alvaro Fernandez, Marc Vidal, Alfonso Pastor

(Defenders) Mateu Jaume, Juan Miranda, Hugo Guillamon, Victor Chust, Eric Garcia, Victor Perea

(Midfielders) Antonio Blanco, Mohamed Aiman, Alvaro Garcia, Carlos Beitia

(Forwards) Ferran Torres, Abel Ruiz, Sergio Gomez, Nacho Diaz, Pedro Ruiz, Diego Pampin, Jose Lara, Cesar Gelabert

iv) Player(s) To Watch Out:

Abel Ruiz (Present Club – FC Barcelona B)

2017 FIFA U-17 World Cup: Team Previews - Group D 4 — Abel Ruiz (Image Source: Google)

Abel Ruiz is a talented centre-forward who had scored four goals and won Silver Boot award (tournament award for scoring third most goals) in the 2017 UEFA European Under-17 Championship. Adding the qualification round of that European championship, Abel Ruiz had scored total 16 goals.

Big Premier League clubs like Manchester City, Arsenal, Chelsea etc. are showing interest in him.