Park Youn-Jeong and her Australia counterpart Leah Blayney are equally confident of kicking off with three points, having prepared well for the continental challenge.

“We started our training session at the end of last November, focusing on honing the playing styles at which our players excel,” said Park.

“Throughout the entire camp, each player showcased their unique strengths, characteristics, and skills, making it exceedingly challenging to finalise the list of 23 players. All of our players are pivotal to the team’s success.”

The Young Taegeuk Ladies are eyeing a third continental title, having won the AFC U-19 Championship in 2004 and 2013.

“Australia’s strongest attributes lie in their technical and physical capabilities. However, we will be ready to perform our best.

“The achievements from previous competitions reflect the efforts of both players and staff who diligently prepared. Their thorough preparation contributed to their success. Similarly, we are committed to achieving the best result in every game.”

After having extensive training camps in Australia and the United Arab Emirates, Blayney believes her team is well prepared.

“Preparations have been good. We have been fortunate to hold a three-day training camp in Australia prior to flying to Dubai where we continued our preparations for another five days. So we had completed three sessions before arriving in Tashkent,” said Blayney.

“In the U20 age group it’s always difficult in terms of final selection. There’s certainly some good players that haven’t made the trip over who may have been unavailable through injury. However, the team is ready to go.

Australia’s best finish in the competition was third in 2006 and Blayney expects her team to be completely focused on the tournament, with the top four teams earning tickets to the FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup Colombia 2024.

“We respect all opponents that we came up against. In terms of the opening match we are prepared to play against a team like Korea Republic, who we know are very strong and we look forward to the challenge.

“We have definitely finished in the top four in previous editions and coming into this tournament we hold high expectations for this team and we are really focused on our performance and building on what we want to be.”