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The Uruguay national football team represents Uruguaymarker in international football competition and is controlled by the Asociación Uruguaya de Fútbol.

Uruguay have won two FIFA World Cups, including the first ever World Cup in 1930 as hosts, beating Argentina 4-2 in the final. They won their second title in 1950, upsetting hosts Brazil 2-1 in the final match. They also won the Gold Medals in football at the Summer Olympics twice, in 1924 and 1928, before the creation of the World Cup. They also won the 1980 Mundialito, a tournament among former World Cup champions Uruguaymarker hosted in 1980 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first World Cup. Uruguay won more international titles (19) in the 20th century than any other country in the world and still holds this record, albeit it is now shared with Argentina.

Their success is amplified by the fact that the nation has a very small population. Uruguaymarker is the only country in the world to win a World Cup with a general population of under 4 million inhabitants and is by far the smallest nation to do so. The second smallest country to have won the World Cup is Argentinamarker with a total population of over 40 million people. Uruguay is also the smallest country ever to win any World Cup medals. In fact, only six nations with populations smaller than Uruguay's have ever participated in any World Cup: Northern Irelandmarker (3 times), Walesmarker, Kuwaitmarker, Jamaicamarker, Sloveniamarker and Trinidad and Tobagomarker. Uruguay is also the smallest nation to win Olympic gold medals in any team sport.

Uruguay is also the smallest member nation of CONMEBOL, South American Football Association. Nethertheless, Uruguayan national team also have won the Copa América 14 different times, a record it shares with Argentina.

However, the level of the Uruguay national team has decreased lately as Uruguay has only qualified on two occasions in the last five World Cups, although it remains a strong team in South America, having reached third place and fourth place in the last two Copa América tournaments, respectively.

History

Prior to 1916, Uruguay played more than 30 matches, of which all but one were against Argentina. The inaugural Copa America provided Uruguay with more varied opposition. Victories over Chile and Brazil along with a tie against Argentina enabled Uruguay to win the tournament. The following year Uruguay hosted the competition, and retained the title by winning every game. The 1919 Copa America saw Uruguay's first defeat in the tournament, a 1-0 defeat in a playoff with Brazil which went to two periods of extra time, the longest Copa America match in history.

In 1924 the Uruguay team traveled to Paris to become the first South American team to compete in the Olympic Games. In contrast to the physical style of the European teams of the era, Uruguay played a style based around short passes, and won every game, defeating Switzerland 3-0 in the gold medal match. In the 1928 Summer Olympics Uruguay went to Amsterdammarker to defend their title, again winning the gold medal after defeating Argentina 2-1 in the final.

Following the double Olympic triumph, Uruguay was chosen as the host nation for the first World Cup, held in 1930, the centenary of Uruguay's independence. During the World Cup, Uruguay won all its matches, and converted a 1-2 half-time deficit to a 4-2 victory against Argentina at the Estadio Centenariomarker. Due to the refusal of some European teams to participate in the first World Cup, the Uruguayan Football Association urged other countries to reciprocate by boycotting the 1934 World Cup played in Italy. For the 1938 World Cup, France was chosen as host, contrary to a previous agreement to alternate the Championships between South America and Europe, so Uruguay again refused to participate.

Uruguay again won the World Cup in 1950, beating hosts Brazil in a surprise result at the Maracanã Stadiummarker, a match known as the Maracanazo.

Since 1950, the national team has had mixed performances in the World Cup, achieving fourth place in 1954 and 1970, but failing to qualify on several occasions. A new generation headed by Francescoli emerged in the mid-1980s, which qualified for the 1986 and 1990 World Cups, reaching the second round. During the 2000s, the less successful generation of Recoba, Forlán and Montero among others qualified for the 2002 World Cup, but were unable to leave the group stage.

Nevertheless, during the same time period from the 1950s, Uruguay won the Copa America six times, most recently in 1995, when Uruguay also hosted the tournament. Each of the seven occasions when the Copa America has been hosted in Uruguay has resulted in the Uruguayan team winning the tournament.

By May 1, 2009 Uruguayan National Team are ranked by FIFA 16th in the world and 3rd in South America, below Brazil and Argentina only.

Stadium

Since 1930, Uruguay have played their home games at the Estadio Centenariomarker in the Uruguayan capital Montevideomarker. The stadium was built as a celebration of Uruguay centenary of independence, and had a capacity of 100,000 when first opened. The stadium hosted several matches in the 1930 World Cup, including the final, which was watched by a crowd of 93,000. Crowds for Uruguay's home matches vary greatly depending on the importance of the match and the quality of the opposition. World Cup qualifying matches often attract crowds of between 60,000 and 70,000, but friendlies sometimes have attendances significantly below 20,000.

Kit

Current Uruguay kits were adopted in 1910 as an homage to now-defunct River Plate F.C., one of the four great clubs of early Uruguayan football; the national team adopted the light blue away jerseys of the club as their home jersey. The current Uruguayan "River" club, CA River Plate not to be confused with more famous Argentine club Club Atletico River Plate, uses home and away kits similar to those of the historic club.

The first international match involving an Uruguayan team took place in Montevideo in 1889, against the "Buenos Aires Team". The "Montevideo Team", the first team to represent Uruguay, was fielded by the still-active Montevideo Cricket Club, which does not participate in football today. The first official international match was played in Montevideo in 1901; on that occasion, the Uruguayan squad wore Montevideo club Albion FC's home kit: Albion was in fact the first domestic side to win a game outside Uruguay, a 1896 match against Argentine club Retiro in Buenos Aires.

Between 1901 and 1910, Uruguay wore a variety of different shirts during matches, including solid green and white tops, and even a shirt modeled from the Flag of Artigas. During games against Argentina, Uruguay would sport vertical blue and white stripes, while the Argentines would wear plain turquoise jerseys. After 1910, the two teams swapped styles, with Argentina adopting light blue and white striped shirts, and Uruguay wearing solid light blue blue shirts.

The red jersey that is used in today's away strip was first used at the 1935 Copa América, held in Santa Beatriz in Perumarker, which Uruguay won. It was not worn again until 1991, when it was officially adopted as the away jersey.

Four stars appear above the team logo on the jersey. Two represent Uruguay's 1930 and 1950 World Cup victories, and the other two represent the gold medals received at the 1924 and 1928 Summer Olympics, which at the time was the most important international football competition.



World Cup Record

Year Round Position GP W D* L GS GA
1930 Champions 1 4 4 0 0 15 3
1934 Withdrew - - - - - - -
1938 Did not enter - - - - - - -
1950 Champions 1 4 3 1 0 15 5
1954 Fourth place 4 5 3 0 2 16 9
1958 Did not qualify - - - - - - -
1962 Round 1 13 3 1 0 2 4 6
1966 Quarter-finals 7 4 1 2 1 2 5
1970 Fourth place 4 6 2 1 3 4 5
1974 Round 1 13 3 0 1 2 1 6
1978 Did not qualify - - - - - - -
1982 Did not qualify - - - - - - -
1986 Round of 16 16 4 0 2 2 2 8
1990 Round of 16 16 4 1 1 2 2 5
1994 Did not qualify - - - - - - -
1998 Did not qualify - - - - - - -
2002 Round 1 26 3 0 2 1 4 5
2006 Did Not Qualify - - - - - - -
2010 Qualified
Total 11/19 2 Titles 40 15 10 15 65 57
*Denotes draws include knockout matches decided on penalty kicks.
**Gold background color indicates that the tournament was won. Red border color indicates tournament was held on home soil.


FIFA Confederations Cup Record

Year Round GP W D* L GS GA
1992 Did not qualify - - - - - -
1995 Did not qualify - - - - - -
1997 Fourth place 5 3 0 2 8 6
1999 Did not qualify - - - - - -
2001 Did not qualify - - - - - -
2003 Did not qualify - - - - - -
2005 Did not qualify - - - - - -
2009 Did not qualify - - - - - -
Total 1/8 5 3 0 2 8 6


Copa América record







Current team status

Uruguay has finished participating in the 2010 World Cup Qualifiers, with a successful result.

2010 FIFA World Cup

Qualification Standings

CONCACAF 4th place v CONMEBOL 5th place

Qualification:

On 18 November 2009, Uruguay qualified for the 2010 FIFA World Cup with a 2–1 win on aggregate against Costa Rica.

Recent, last and next games



KEY: F = Friendly match; WCQ2010 = 2010 FIFA World Cup qualification



Current players

Current squad

The following players have been called up for the 2010 FIFA World Cup qualification matches against Costa Rica on November 14, 2009 in San José, Costa Ricamarker and on November 18, 2009 in Montevideomarker, Uruguaymarker.

Caps and goals as of November 18, 2009.







Recent Call Ups

The following players have also been called up to the Uruguay squad in the past 12 months.







Player records

Most caps

1. Rodolfo Rodríguez(79) 1976-1986

2. Enzo Francescoli(72) 1983-1997

3. Fabian Carini(70) 1999-

4. Álvaro Recoba(69) 1995-2007

5. Ángel Romano(68)

6. Pablo Gabriel García(68)

7. Carlos Aguilera(65)

8. Paolo Montero(61)

9. Jorge Barrios(61)

10. Diego Forlán(60) 2002-

Top Goalscorers

1. Hector Scarone(31) 1917-1930

2. Ángel Romano(28)

3. Sebastián Abreu(28) 1997-

4. Óscar Míguez(27)

5. Pedro Petrone(27)

6. Carlos Aguilera(23) 1983-1997

7. Diego Forlán(22) 2002-

8. Fernando Morena(22)

9. José Piendibene(21)

10. Hector Castro(20)

World Cup Winning Captains

1st 1930 José Nasazzi51(1)

2nd 1950 Obdulio Varela45(9)

Coaches



Trivia

  • Uruguay and Argentina hold the record for the most international matches played between two countries. The two teams have faced each other 161 times since 1901. The first match against Argentina was the first official international match to be played outside the United Kingdom and Ireland.


Footnotes

  1. FIFA World Cup Origin, FIFA Media Release. Retrieved on 16 October 2006.
  2. There was no official World Cup final match in 1950. The tournament winner was decided by a final round-robin group contested by four teams (Uruguay, Brazil, Sweden, and Spain). However, Uruguay's 2-1 victory over Brazil (a match known as Maracanazo) was the decisive match (and also coincidentally one of the last two matches of the tournament) which put them ahead on points and ensured that they finished top of the group as world champions. Therefore, this match is often considered the "final" of the 1950 World Cup . Likewise, Sweden's 3-1 victory over Spain (played at the same time as Uruguay vs Brazil) ensured that they finished third.
  3. Argentina-Uruguay Matches 1901-2001. RSSSF.
  4. Although Canada and the United States played two internationals in 1885 and 1889, neither match is considered official; Canada did not play an official international until 1904 and the USA did not play one until 1916.


External links



Titles


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