Dominican Republic: FIFA TSG land for U-17 Women’s World Cup

The best young players in the world will showcase their talents in the host cities of Santa Domingo and Santiago de los Caballeros as 16 teams compete across four groups. Spain were crowned champions in Costa Rica 2022, winning the tournament for the second time, while DPR Korea, Korea Republic, France and Japan are also former winners.

As always, FIFA’s Technical Study Group and Football Performance Insights Team will be on site to attend and observe all 32 matches, monitoring the technical and tactical trends that emerge. These topics will be explored in detail throughout the competition and in the post-tournament report, all of which will be available on the FIFA TrainingCentre’s Tournament Observations page.

Here, we introduce our TSG members and full team for FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup Dominican Republic 2024™.

Pascal Zuberbühler is FIFA’s Senior Football and Goalkeeping expert and brings vast experience to the Technical Study Group. During his club career, he played for seven years at Grasshoppers, followed by another seven at FC Basel before spells with Bayer Leverkusen in Germany, and West Bromwich Albion and Fulham in England.   

“Zubi” has been part of the TSG for all FIFA tournaments, men’s and women’s, over the last number of years and the former Switzerland national team goalkeeper always has a keen eye on trends relating to his former playing position.    

“After attending the recent FIFA U-20 World Cup 2024 in Colombia, I am really interested to see the standard of goalkeeping. Having variety and accuracy in distribution is now a very important skillset for world-class goalkeepers and they need to be comfortable on both feet. 

With the continued professionalisation of the women’s game, Zubi has recognised the growth and development of female goalkeepers in recent years, as the benefits of full-time and expert goalkeeper training are becoming more evident. 

“Goalkeepers at underage level are very becoming very explosive and can exert real power and strength in their goalkeeping actions. This was also evident during the FIFA U-20 World Cup last month where we saw goalkeepers delivering longer and faster passes forward compared to 2022, so I am very interested to see if this pattern replicates at U-17 level. 

When it comes to the playing styles of different teams, Zubi believes it is interesting to see if this changes from one tournament to the next, depending on the players selected and the coach’s preferences. Does the member association have a clear playing style, or do they adapt based on the strengths of the players available? 

 “From a team level, it will be interesting to see if Colombia are still prominent at this level. They made the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup final in Costa Rica two years ago with a strong transition game, before losing to a very technical Spanish team and we were fortunate to see a number of those players again at the recent FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup tournament. This progression for players is very important for us to monitor as we look to establish the world-class technical and tactical qualities that players in each position has mastered, because this information is crucial for player development pathways and programmes. 

“Also, the winners last time, Spain, had a very clear philosophy of playing out from the back and progressing the ball through the thirds with very technical players. They always looked to create overloads ahead of the ball and used their numerical supremacy very effectively to distort opposition defences and break lines. Will they play the same way or have a different approach this time?” he added. 

There are also teams involved in this tournament that did not qualify for the last edition in Costa Rica, including England and Korea DPR. For Zubi, these teams will bring a different dimension also. “At senior level, England are the reigning European Champions 2022, but they did not qualify for the recent Olympic games, nor did they make the U-20 World Cup so their experiences in Dominican Republic are important for their development. We also saw Korea DPR win the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup 2024 but they also did not have a team qualify for the Olympics or the previous FIFA Women’s World Cup Australia & New Zealand 2023 so it will be interesting to see what the playing style of this team is compared to the older age group, because they were technically outstanding, tactically astute and their players had a very strong winning mentality.  

“This will be a fascinating competition, and I really expect the levels to be very high because the qualified nations all have strong footballing traditions, including the USA, Brazil, Japan, Zambia and Nigeria.” 

With over 90 senior caps for Switzerland, Vanessa Bernauer brings a wealth of experience to our Technical Study Group. She represented her country at FIFA Women’s World Cup Canada 2015 and UEFA Women’s Euro 2017 and was also part of the Switzerland squad that won the 2017 Cyprus Cup. 

The FC Zürich Frauen midfielder has also had spells playing in Spain, Germany and Italy at Levante, Wolfsburg, Roma, respectively. She has won the Frauen Bundesliga, DFB Pokal, Coppa Italia, Swiss Cup and is a four-time winner of Switzerland’s Nationalliga A. During her time at Wolfsburg, she played in the 2016 UEFA Champions League final, finishing as runners-up to Lyon. 

Bernauer joins the Technical Study Group for the first time, and she is expecting a high-level tournament. 

“For any player, to play at a World Cup level is a significant experience. With the continued professionalisation of the women’s game, some of these young players will already be playing in full-time environments so their technical skill levels should already be quite high. Learning to execute and adapt tactical strategies is a very important part of each player’s development and I am very interested to see the different approaches and playing styles of the variety of teams from different confederations,” she explained.   

Born and raised in Bermuda, Shaun Goater, started his playing days at his much-respected local club, North Village, from where much football talent has been developed. After securing a big move to Manchester United, Goater moved to Rotherham United in search of first-team football. A successful spell at Bristol City followed where he came to the attention of Manchester City and eventually became the top goal-scorer at the club in four of his five seasons. 

Following his retirement from playing, Goater established a semi-professional football club in his native Bermuda to help young players break through into the professional game. More recently he worked as an assistant coach Manchester City Women’s team and is currently the assistant head coach with Aston Villa Women’s team.   

“Having been part of the Technical Study Group for the FIFA U-20 World Cup Argentina 2023, I found it really interesting to see the similarities between the playing styles of the underage teams to the senior team. For example, Nigeria are typically strong, fast and technical at senior women’s level so I am keen to see if the U-17 side have a similar playing style. Both Korea DPR and Korea Republic tend to have very technical, disciplined teams so again, it will be fascinating to see how their U-17 sides approach the tournament.  

“Spain, as the most recent winners, tend to be very technical while Brazil often have flair players and then the USA are going through a transition phase at all levels of the women’s game so will we see something new from them? It’s so interesting to see if the traditional football DNA of these nations transfer to women’s U-17 level,” he added.