U-17 USWYNT: The USA should be in Pot 1 for the draw of the 2025 FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup

Last weekend, the United States, along with Mexico, Canada, and Costa Rica, all qualified for this year’s FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup. Those four Concacaf teams joined seven other teams that have already qualified, including the host of this year’s FIFA U-17 WWC, Morocco. Thirteen more slots remain to be filled from three confederations: CAF (Africa), CONMEBOL (South America), and UEFA (Europe).

Assuming that FIFA continues to use the same ranking methodology for this year’s tournament as it has for the past few U-17 WWCs, the USA should have either the fourth-highest or third-highest seeding coefficient, which would put the USA in the first pot of the draw that will determine the groups for this year’s FIFA U-17 WWC. Only one of the 26 teams that are still alive in qualifying, Spain, will have a higher seeding coefficient for the draw than the USA.

The primary advantage of being in Pot 1 is that the USA will not face any of the other Pot 1 teams, such as Korea DPR and Spain, until at least the Round of Sixteen, should the USA advance out of its group. However, the USA could still end up with a difficult group due to the nature of the ranking system and the distribution of teams from each confederation.

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Overview of Seeding Methodology

Since 2016, the pot seeding for the FIFA Under-17 Women’s World Cup has used a ranking methodology that is based primarily on the performance of each federation at past FIFA U-17 WWCs. A bonus is also given to a team that win its respective’s confederation qualifying tournament.

In 2024 and 2022, the results of the five most recent FIFA U-17 WWCs were used. A standard 3-1-0 point system was used, with three points given for a win, one point for a draw (regardless of whether there was a penalty shootout winner), and no points for a loss. If a team does not appear in an edition of the U-17 WWC, it is given zero points.

The point totals for each tournament are tallied separately and then adjusted by a weighting system. The most recent tournament is given full weight (100%), while each previous tournament is reduced via 20% increments.

For 2025, the weights are expected to be as follows:

2024: 100%
2022: 80%
2018: 60%
2016: 40%
2014: 20%

A five point bonus is also given to the current champions of confederation qualifying tournaments. However, not all confederations crown a champion. For 2025, three confederations did not use tournament formats for qualifying: The AFC (which did not hold any qualifying), CAF, and Concacaf.

Teams with higher coefficients are ranked ahead of teams with lower coefficients, except for the host team, which is automatically placed in Pot 1 (and given the first slot in Group A).

If two or more teams have the same coefficient numbers, a “tiebreaker” system is used:

For the first level of tiebreakers, the teams’ points total at previous FIFA U-17 WWCs, starting with the most recent are used. If two teams have the same total points, then the most recent FIFA U-17 WWC where the two teams have different coefficient numbers is used. No limit is specified, so presumably this could go back all the way to the 2008 edition.
If the two teams are tied on all first-level tiebreakers, next, the total ranking points for the entire of each team’s respective confederations, starting with the most recent FIFA U-17 WWC, is used.
If two or more teams cannot be separated by the above methods, then a drawing of lots is used.

Example

For 2025, the USA’s coefficient should be 21.4. Its unadjusted ranking points from the five most recent edition are as follows:

2024: 12 points (4 wins * 3 points)
2022: 8 points (2 wins * 3 points + 2 draws * 1 point)
2018: 3 points (1 win * 3 points)
2016: 3 points (1 win * 3 points
2014: 0 points {did not qualify}

Applying the weights, these are the adjusted ranking points for each of the five above editions:

2024: 12 points (12 points * 1.0)
2022: 6.4 (8 points * 0.8)
2018: 1.8 (3 points * 0.6)
2016: 1.2 (3 points * 0.4)
2014: 0 (0 points * 0.2)

Concacaf did not hold a proper championship tournament with a knockout bracket or even a second group stage (cf. CONMEBOL youth tournaments), so the bonus 5 points for winning a confederation qualifying tournament is not applicable.

Looking Ahead: If the USA does not win or draw any matches at the 2025 FIFA U-17 WWC, its coefficient for 2026 would be 16.2. To stay in Pot 1, the USA would likely need to earn at least six points (e.g. two wins) in the 2025 edition.

The North Korea Exception

The draw for the 2024 edition had one unannounced quirk: The coefficient for Korea DPR was calculated differently from the other fourteen non-host teams. Korea DPR was forced to withdraw from both FIFA women’s youth WWCs in 2022 due to COVID-related travel restrictions put in place by North Korea, so under the published methodology, its points total for the 2022 edition would be zero. For unspecified reasons, FIFA gave 100% weighting to Korea DPR’s 2018 results, 80% to Korea DPR’s 2016 results, and so on. If FIFA did not use an adjusted coefficient for Korea DPR, the USA would have been the final team in Pot 1, rather than Korea DPR.

FIFA documents:

Qualified Teams (as of April 6)

So far, only Oceania and Concacaf have held qualifying events. Morocco qualified automatically as the host. Due to the timing of the FIFA U-17 WWC transitioning to an annual event, the AFC decided not to hold qualifying this year. Instead, it nominated its four representatives, ostensibly based on their performances in the last three U-17 Women’s Asian Cups (AFC press release).

Host (1):

Morocco

Asian Football Confederation (4):

China
Japan
Korea DPR
Korea Republic

Concacaf (4):

Canada
Costa Rica
Mexico
United States

Oceania Football Confederation (2):

New Zealand*
Samoa

*won confederation’s championship tournament

Potential Teams (as of April 6)

Confederation of African Football (4 spots)

CAF’s qualifying format consists of three rounds of home-and-away knock-out matches. The first two rounds were played in January and March. The final round will be contested later this month, with the final matches to be played on Saturday, April 26. (Wikipedia)

Third-Round Pairings:

Nigeria or Algeria
Kenya or Cameroon
Côte d’Ivoire or Guinea
Zambia or Benin

Of those eight teams, Nigeria is the only team with a substantial ranking coefficient. However, at 18.4, it is lower than the USA’s. If Nigeria qualifies, it should have the fifth-highest ranking coefficient, which would place it last in Pot 1.

CONMEBOL (4 spots)

The format for the CONMEBOL Sudamericano Femenino Sub-17 involves two rounds of group stages. In the first round, the 10 CONMEBOL teams are divided into two groups of five. The top three teams from each group advance to a final round of six teams. (Wikipedia)

The tournament will be played from Thursday, May 1, to Sunday, May 25.

The first round groups:

Group A: Colombia (host), Argentina, Chile, Paraguay, Venezuela
Group B: Brazil, Bolivia, Ecuador, Peru, Uruguay

Brazil, which has qualified for all but one of the previous FIFA U-17 WWCs, and Colombia, which failed to qualify in 2010 and 2016, should be in the top four of the second round. The other two spots are closer to toss-ups.

Brazil has the higher ranking coefficient, at 13.2, which could go up to 18.2, if it tops the second-round table. Even if it did, Brazil’s coefficient would not surpass the USA’s or Nigeria’s.

UEFA (5 spots)

The 2025 UEFA Women’s Under-17 Championship will run from Sunday, May 4, to Saturday, May 17. The top two teams from each four-team group will qualify for this year’s FIFA U-17 WWC, along with the winner of fifth-place playoff match. The top four teams will play semifinal matches, with the winners of those match facing off in a title match. (Wikipedia)

The Championship groups:

Group A: Faroe Islands (host), Austria, Netherlands, Norway
Group B: Spain, France, Italy, Poland

As noted above, Spain, which will have a minimum of 44.0 ranking points, is the only yet-to-qualify team that could surpass the USA.

Notably absent is Germany, which failed to reach a UEFA Women’s Under-17 Championship for the second time in a row. Germany could have surpassed the USA if it had qualified for this year’s FIFA U-17 WWC, but it would have needed to win the UEFA Women’s Under-17 Championship (17.0 ranking points + 5.0 bonus points = 22.0).

Also absent is England, which finished fourth at the 2024 FIFA U-17 WWC, after losing to the USA in the Third-Place Match.

Pots 1 and 2: Predicted Teams

Bolded teams have already qualified.

Pot 1

0. Morocco (Host, 2.4 points)
1. Spain (44.0 or 49.0 points)
2. Japan (28.8 points)
3. Korea DPR (26.6 points unadjusted, 34.0 points adjusted)
4. United States (21.4 points)
5. Nigeria (18.4 points)

Pot 2

6. Brazil (18.2 or 13.2 points)
7. New Zealand (13.4 points)
8. Mexico (11.8 points)
9. Colombia (10.2 or 15.2 points)
10. Canada (9.6 points)
11. ???

For the final slot in Pot 2, China PR (3.0 points) is the highest qualified team, but three potential teams — Venezuela (6.2 points), Ecuador (6.0 points), and Poland (5.0 points) — would each surpass China PR just by qualifying. Additionally, other teams from UEFA and/or CONMEBOL could also surpass China PR by earning five bonus points via winning their respective confederation championship.

At this time, the composition of Pots 3 and 4 remains fairly speculative due to the wide range of teams that could qualify. Most of the teams in Pot 4 will likely have zero ranking points, as at least a few will be debutantes, with others, such as Costa Rica, qualifying for the first time in over a decade.