Canada won the 2010 CONCACAF Women’s Under-17 Championship on Saturday 20 March in Alajuela, Costa Rica. The victory marked Canada’s eighth confederation championship and first at the women’s U-17 level. The junior Canucks won 1:0 over Mexico in the final match of the competition.

“We are ecstatic,” said national coach Bryan Rosenfeld. “To come out as CONCACAF champions, winning a gold medal through all the adversity… we definitely took the hard road. It showed a lot of character from our Canadian girls.”

For more information on the Canada-Mexico match, please visit the following fixture link.

Kinley McNicoll scored the lone goal of the match in the eighth minute giving Canada an early lead it would not relinquish. The Canadians played the final 33 minutes down a player following a red card, but defended strongly and held on for the win.

Canada finished in second place in Group 2 setting up a semi-final clash with tournament favorites USA. Despite coming into the match having scored 32 goals in three group games the USA could not find a way through Canada’s organized defence. The match finished 0:0 after extra time and moved to kicks from the penalty mark. Canada converted all five of its kicks to win 5-3 setting up the Canada-Mexico showdown in the final.

Canada, whose title sponsor is BMO, will now look forward to participating in the FIFA Women’s U-17 World Cup Trinidad and Tobago 2010 this September. Mexico and host Trinidad and Tobago will also represent CONCACAF at the competition.