2018 U-20 Copa Libertadores


The 2018 U-20 Copa CONMEBOL Libertadores was the 4th edition of the U-20 Copa CONMEBOL Libertadores, South America's premier under-20 club football tournament organized by CONMEBOL. The tournament was held in Uruguay from 10 to 24 February 2018.
Nacional defeated Independiente del Valle in the final to win their first title, while River Plate defeated defending champions São Paulo to finish third.

Teams

The competition was contested by 12 teams: the title holders, the youth champions from each of the ten CONMEBOL member associations, and one additional team from the host association.
Players must be born on or after 1 January 1998.
AssociationTeamQualifying methodParticipationPrevious best result
ArgentinaTalleres2017 Torneo Juvenil de Cuarta División champions1st—
BoliviaQuebracho2017 U-19 Torneo Nacional champions1st—
BrazilSão Paulo2016 U-20 Copa Libertadores champions2ndChampions
BrazilCruzeiro2017 U-20 Supercopa de Brasil champions1st—
ChileColo-Colo2017 U-19 Copa de Campeones champions1st—
ColombiaLa Equidad2017 U-20 Súper Copa Juvenil champions1st—
EcuadorIndependiente del Valle2017 U-18 Serie A champions4thQuarterfinals
ParaguayLibertad2017 play-off winners between U-20 Apertura and Clausura champions3rdQuarterfinals
PeruSport Huancayo2017 Torneo de Promoción y Reserva champions1st—
Uruguay Nacional2017 U-19 Campeonato Uruguayo champions2ndQuarterfinals
Uruguay River Plate2017 U-19 Campeonato Uruguayo runners-up1st—
VenezuelaAtlético Venezuela2017 U-20 Serie Oro champions1st—

Venues

The tournament was played at the Estadio Centenario in Montevideo.

Draw

The draw was held on 25 January 2018, 16:00 UYT, at the headquarters of the Uruguayan Football Association. The 12 teams were drawn into three groups of four. The defending champions São Paulo were automatically seeded into Pot 1 and allocated to position A1 in the group stage, while the other two teams which also participated in the 2016 U-20 Copa Libertadores, Independiente del Valle and Libertad, were also seeded into Pot 1 and drawn to position B1 or C1 in the group stage. The remaining teams were seeded into Pot 2, and drawn to positions 2, 3 or 4 of groups A, B or C in the group stage. Teams from the same association could not be drawn into the same group.
Pot 1Pot 2

Group stage

In the group stage, the teams were ranked according to points. If tied on points, tiebreakers were applied in the following order :
  1. Goal difference;
  2. Goals scored;
  3. Head-to-head result in games between tied teams;
  4. Penalty shoot-out
  5. Drawing of lots.
The winners of each group and the best runner-up among all groups advanced to the semi-finals.
All times local, UYT.

Group A

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Group B

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Group C

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Ranking of group runners-up

Knockout stage

The semi-final matchups were:
The semi-final winners and losers played in the final and third place match respectively. If tied after full time, extra time was not played, and the penalty shoot-out was used to determine the winner.

Bracket

Semi-finals

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Third place match

Final