Cape Town Hosting 2009 Peace Cup

Cape Town soccer fans in for a treat with international U-19 Cup before FIFA 2010 starts

Cape Town soccer fans are in for a treat towards the end of 2009, when the inaugural Cape Town Peace Cup will take place in the Mother City. The tournament, which will feature four local and four international under-19 teams, was officially announced at the Athlone Stadium.

The organiser of the tournament is the South African Peace (SAPC) in cooperation with the Nobel Peace Center (Oslo, Norway) and Cape Town.

International teams that will participate include, Boca Juniors (Argentina), Eintracht Frankfurt (Germany), Chelsea (England), and Stabaek (Norway). The local teams will comprise of Orlando Pirates, Santos, Ajax Cape Town, and Supersport United.

We are honoured to have this calibre of teams participating in this tournament," said SAPC CEO Kjetil Siem.

The message of peace and harmony needs to be spread across the world through every possible medium, and football can play a huge part in ensuring this."

The iconic Nobel Peace Center in the heart of Oslo was the venue for the draw for the Cape Town Peace Cup held 8th October 2009.

The draw was conducted by the CEO of the Nobel Peace Center, Bente Erichsen, and Nelson Mandela's grandson, Chief Mandla Mandela in the company of club representatives, the City of Cape Town and many other dignitaries.

The eight under 19 teams competing in the tournament have been drawn into the following groups:

GROUP A : Ajax Cape Town, Santos, Stabaek, and Boca Juniors

GROUP B: SuperSport United, Orlando Pirates, Chelsea, and Eintracht Frankfurt

Fixtures for the above matches will be announced at a later stage. Speaking at the draw, Nobel Peace Center CEO, Bente Erichsen, expressed her joy at her organisation being a key part of this event.

"Our focus at the Nobel Peace Center is respect, equality and brotherhood. Football can create fellowship that transcends beyond all boundaries and for us this is key," explained Erichsen.

"For the City of Cape Town, the Peace Cup presents a further opportunity in the unification process. We know that sport play's a major role in unifying countries and this is what we'd like to see at the end of the day when the South African team's take on their international counterparts," said Councillor Gerhard Ras of the City of Cape Town.

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