# Football at the 2020 Summer Olympics – Men's tournament

The men's football tournament at the 2020 Summer Olympics was held from 22 July to 7 August 2021. Originally, it was to be held from 23 July to 8 August 2020, but the Summer Olympics were postponed to the following year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the official name of the games remains the 2020 Summer Olympics. It was the 27th edition of the men's Olympic football tournament. Together with the women's competition, the 2020 Summer Olympics football tournament was held at six stadiums in six cities in Japan. The final was hosted at the International Stadium in Yokohama. Teams participating in the men's competition were restricted to under-24 players (born on or after 1 January 1997) with a maximum of three overage players allowed. The men's tournament is typically restricted to under-23 players though following the postponement of the Olympics by a year, FIFA decided to maintain the restriction of players born on or after 1 January 1997.
Brazil were the defending champions and successfully retained their title.

## Schedule

The match schedule of the tournament as of 5 December 2018.
| 22 Thu | 23 Fri | 24 Sat | 25 Sun | 26 Mon | 27 Tue | 28 Wed | 29 Thu | 30 Fri | 31 Sat | 1 Sun | 2 Mon | 3 Tue | 4 Wed | 5 Thu | 6 Fri | 7 Sat |
| G | | | G | | | G | | | ¼ | | | ½ | | | B | F |

## Qualification

In addition to host nation Japan, 15 men's national teams will qualify from six separate continental confederations. The Organising Committee for FIFA Competitions ratified the distribution of spots at their meeting on 14 September 2017.
| Means of qualification | Dates | Venue(s) | Berth(s) | Qualified |
| Host nation | — | — | 1 | Japan |
| 2019 UEFA European Under-21 Championship | 16–30 June 2019 | Italy San Marino | 4 | Spain Germany France Romania |
| 2019 OFC Men's Olympic Qualifying Tournament | 21 September – 5 October 2019 | Fiji | 1 | New Zealand |
| 2019 Africa U-23 Cup of Nations | 8–22 November 2019 | Egypt | 3 | Egypt Ivory Coast South Africa |
| 2020 AFC U-23 Championship | 8–26 January 2020 | Thailand | 3 | South Korea Saudi Arabia Australia |
| 2020 CONMEBOL Pre-Olympic Tournament | 18 January – 9 February 2020 | Colombia | 2 | Argentina Brazil |
| 2020 CONCACAF Olympic Qualifying Championship | 18–30 March 2021 | Mexico | 2 | Mexico Honduras |
| Total | | | 16 | |
* ^1 Dates and venues are those of final tournaments (or final round of qualification tournaments), various qualification stages may precede matches at these specific venues.

## Venues

| Chōfu (Tokyo Area) | Saitama | Yokohama |
| Tokyo Stadium | Saitama Stadium 2002 | International Stadium Yokohama |
| Capacity: 49,970 | Capacity: 63,700 | Capacity: 72,327 |
| Kashima | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Ibaraki Kashima Stadium | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Capacity: 37,638 | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Rifu | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Miyagi Stadium | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Capacity: 49,133 | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Sapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Sapporo Dome | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
| Capacity: 42,065 | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo | YokohamaSaitamaRifuTokyoKashimaSapporo |
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Japan, most matches were played behind closed doors without any spectators. However, Miyagi Stadium allowed a limited audience to attend matches and Kashima Stadium permitted local schoolchildren as part of the school program but Olympic spectators were still not allowed.

## Squads

The men's tournament was an international tournament with restrictions on age: players had to be born on or after 1 January 1997, with three overage players allowed for each squad in the final tournament. Traditionally the roster rules required each team to submit a squad of 18 players, two of whom must be goalkeepers. Each team also named a list of four alternate players, who could replace any player in the squad in case of injury during the tournament. In late June 2021 the International Olympic Committee and FIFA announced that all 22 players of each team would be available for selection before each match. Prior to each match, the teams chose from their total of 22 players, a roster of 18 players to be available for play in that match. The rule change was made in regards to the challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic.

## Match officials

In June 2020, FIFA approved the use of the video assistant referee (VAR) system for the tournament. The match officials were announced on 23 April 2021.
Match officials :
| Confederation | Referee | Assistant referees |
| AFC | Chris Beath (Australia) | Ashley Beecham (Australia) Anton Schetinin (Australia) |
| AFC | Adham Makhadmeh (Jordan) | Mohammad Al-Kalaf (Jordan) Ahmad Al-Roalle (Jordan) |
| CAF | Victor Gomes (South Africa) | Souru Phatsoane (Lesotho) Arsenio Marengula (Mozambique) |
| CAF | Bamlak Tessema Weyesa (Ethiopia) | Mohammed Ibrahim (Sudan) Gilbert Cheruiyot (Kenya) |
| CONCACAF | Iván Barton (El Salvador) | David Moran (El Salvador) Zachari Zeegelaar (Suriname) |
| CONCACAF | Ismail Elfath (United States) | Kyle Atkins (United States) Corey Parker (United States) |
| CONMEBOL | Leodán González (Uruguay) | Nicolás Taran (Uruguay) Richard Trinidad (Uruguay) |
| CONMEBOL | Kevin Ortega (Peru) | Michael Orué (Peru) Jesús Sánchez (Peru) |
| CONMEBOL | Jesús Valenzuela (Venezuela) | Tulio Moreno (Venezuela) Lubin Torrealba (Venezuela) |
| OFC | Matthew Conger (New Zealand) | Tevita Makasini (Tonga) Mark Rule (New Zealand) |
| UEFA | Orel Grinfeld (Israel) | Roy Hassan (Israel) Idan Yarkoni (Israel) |
| UEFA | Srđan Jovanović (Serbia) | Uros Stojkovic (Serbia) Milan Mihajlovic (Serbia) |
| UEFA | Georgi Kabakov (Bulgaria) | Martin Margaritov (Bulgaria) Diyan Valkov (Bulgaria) |
| UEFA | Artur Soares Dias (Portugal) | Rui Tavares (Portugal) Paulo Santos (Portugal) |
Fourth officials :
| Confederation | Referee |
| AFC | Hiroyuki Kimura (Japan) |
| CAF | Dahane Beida (Mauritania) |
Video assistant referees :
| Confederation | Video assistant referee |
| AFC | Fu Ming (China PR) |
| AFC | Abdulla Al-Marri (Qatar) |
| AFC | Muhammad Taqi (Singapore) |
| CAF | Mahmoud Mohamed Ashour (Egypt) |
| CAF | Adil Zourak (Morocco) |
| CONCACAF | Edvin Jurisevic (United States) |
| CONCACAF | Erick Miranda (Mexico) |
| CONCACAF | Chris Penso (United States) |
| CONMEBOL | Andrés Cunha (Uruguay) |
| CONMEBOL | Nicolás Gallo (Colombia) |
| CONMEBOL | Wagner Reway (Brazil) |
| CONMEBOL | Mauro Vigliano (Argentina) |
| UEFA | Abdulkadir Bitigen (Turkey) |
| UEFA | Guillermo Cuadra Fernández (Spain) |
| UEFA | Marco Guida (Italy) |
| UEFA | Tiago Martins (Portugal) |
| UEFA | Benoît Millot (France) |
| UEFA | Paweł Raczkowski (Poland) |
| UEFA | Roi Reinshreiber (Israel) |
| UEFA | Bibiana Steinhaus (Germany) |

## Draw

The draw for the tournament was held on 21 April 2021, 10:00 CEST (UTC+2), at the FIFA headquarters in Zürich, Switzerland. It was conducted by Sarai Bareman, FIFA chief women's football officer, while Samantha Johnson presented the ceremony. Lindsay Tarpley and Ryan Nelsen acted as the draw assistants.
The sixteen teams were drawn into four groups of four teams. The hosts Japan were automatically seeded into Pot 1 and assigned to position A1, while the remaining teams were seeded into their respective pots based on their results in the last five Olympics (more recent tournaments weighted more heavily), with bonus points awarded to confederation champions. No group could contain more than one team from each confederation.
| Pot 1 | Pot 2 | Pot 3 | Pot 4 |
| Japan (assigned to A1)  Brazil  Argentina  South Korea | Mexico  Germany  Honduras  Spain | Egypt  New Zealand  Ivory Coast  South Africa | Australia  Saudi Arabia  France  Romania |

## Group stage

The competing countries were divided into four groups of four teams, denoted as groups A, B, C and D. Teams in each group played one another in a round-robin basis with the top two teams of each group advancing to the quarter-finals.
All times are local, JST (UTC+9).

### Tiebreakers

The ranking of teams in the group stage was determined as follows:
* Points obtained in all group matches (three points for a win, one for a draw, none for a defeat);
* Goal difference in all group matches;
* Number of goals scored in all group matches;
* Points obtained in the matches played between the teams in question;
* Goal difference in the matches played between the teams in question;
* Number of goals scored in the matches played between the teams in question;
* Fair play points in all group matches (only one deduction could be applied to a player in a single match): Yellow card: −1 point;Indirect red card (second yellow card): −3 points;Direct red card: −4 points;Yellow card and direct red card: −5 points;
* Drawing of lots.

### Group A

| Pos | Teamvte | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification |
| 1 | Japan (H) | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 7 | 1 | +6 | 9 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 2 | Mexico | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 8 | 3 | +5 | 6 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 3 | France | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 5 | 11 | −6 | 3 | |
| 4 | South Africa | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 8 | −5 | 0 | |

### Group B

| Pos | Teamvte | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification |
| 1 | South Korea | 3 | 2 | 0 | 1 | 10 | 1 | +9 | 6 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 2 | New Zealand | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 4 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 3 | Romania | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 4 | −3 | 4 | |
| 4 | Honduras | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 9 | −6 | 3 | |

### Group C

| Pos | Teamvte | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification |
| 1 | Spain | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 1 | +1 | 5 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 2 | Egypt | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | +1 | 4 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 3 | Argentina | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | −1 | 4 | |
| 4 | Australia | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 3 | −1 | 3 | |

### Group D

| Pos | Teamvte | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Qualification |
| 1 | Brazil | 3 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 7 | 3 | +4 | 7 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 2 | Ivory Coast | 3 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 3 | 2 | +1 | 5 | Advance to knockout stage |
| 3 | Germany | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 7 | −1 | 4 | |
| 4 | Saudi Arabia | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 4 | 8 | −4 | 0 | |

## Knockout stage

In the knockout stage, if a match was level at the end of normal playing time, extra time was played (two periods of 15 minutes each) and followed, if necessary, by a penalty shoot-out to determine the winner.

### Bracket

| Quarter-finals | Quarter-finals | Semi-finals | Semi-finals | | Gold medal match | Gold medal match |
| 31 July – Yokohama | 31 July – Yokohama | | | |
| South Korea | 3 | | | |
| South Korea | 3 | 3 August – Kashima | 3 August – Kashima | | |
| Mexico | 6 | 3 August – Kashima | 3 August – Kashima | |
| Mexico | 6 | Mexico | 0 (1) | |
| 31 July – Saitama | 31 July – Saitama | | Mexico | 0 (1) | |
| 31 July – Saitama | 31 July – Saitama | Brazil (p) | 0 (4) | |
| Brazil | 1 | Brazil (p) | 0 (4) | |
| Brazil | 1 | | | | 7 August – Yokohama | 7 August – Yokohama |
| Egypt | 0 | | | | 7 August – Yokohama | 7 August – Yokohama |
| Egypt | 0 | | | | Brazil (a.e.t.) | 2 |
| 31 July – Kashima | 31 July – Kashima | | | | | Brazil (a.e.t.) | 2 |
| 31 July – Kashima | 31 July – Kashima | | | | Spain | 1 |
| Japan (p) | 0 (4) | | | | Spain | 1 |
| Japan (p) | 0 (4) | 3 August – Saitama | 3 August – Saitama | | | |
| New Zealand | 0 (2) | 3 August – Saitama | 3 August – Saitama | | | |
| New Zealand | 0 (2) | Japan | 0 | | | |
| 31 July – Rifu | 31 July – Rifu | | Japan | 0 | | | |
| 31 July – Rifu | 31 July – Rifu | Spain (a.e.t.) | 1 | | Bronze medal match | Bronze medal match |
| Spain (a.e.t.) | 5 | Spain (a.e.t.) | 1 | | Bronze medal match | Bronze medal match |
| Spain (a.e.t.) | 5 | | | | 6 August – Saitama | 6 August – Saitama |
| Ivory Coast | 2 | | | | 6 August – Saitama | 6 August – Saitama |
| Ivory Coast | 2 | | | | Mexico | 3 |
| | | | | | Japan | 1 |

### Gold medal match
## Statistics
### Goalscorers

There were 93 goals scored in 32 matches, for an average of 2.91 goals per match.
5 goals
* Richarlison
4 goals
* André-Pierre Gignac
* Sebastián Córdova
* Hwang Ui-jo
3 goals
* Matheus Cunha
* Takefusa Kubo
* Henry Martín
* Alexis Vega
* Lee Kang-in
* Rafa Mir
* Mikel Oyarzabal
2 goals
* Ragnar Ache
* Nadiem Amiri
* Eduardo Aguirre
* Luis Romo
* Chris Wood
* Sami Al-Najei
* Lee Dong-gyeong
1 goal
* Tomás Belmonte
* Facundo Medina
* Marco Tilio
* Lachlan Wales
* Malcom
* Paulinho
* Amar Hamdy
* Ahmed Yasser Rayyan
* Téji Savanier
* Eduard Löwen
* Felix Uduokhai
* Juan Carlos Obregón Jr.
* Luis Palma
* Rigoberto Rivas
* Eric Bailly
* Max Gradel
* Franck Kessié
* Ritsu Dōan
* Daizen Maeda
* Kaoru Mitoma
* Koji Miyoshi
* Hiroki Sakai
* Roberto Alvarado
* Uriel Antuna
* Johan Vásquez
* Liberato Cacace
* Abdulelah Al-Amri
* Salem Al-Dawsari
* Kobamelo Kodisang
* Evidence Makgopa
* Teboho Mokoena
* Kim Jin-ya
* Um Won-sang
* Won Du-jae
* Marco Asensio
* Mikel Merino
* Dani Olmo
1 own goal
* Benjamin Henrichs (against Ivory Coast)
* Elvin Oliva (against Romania)
* Marius Marin (against South Korea)
* Abdulelah Al-Amri (against Ivory Coast)
Source: FIFA

## Final ranking

As per statistical convention in football, matches decided in extra time are counted as wins and losses, while matches decided by penalty shoot-outs are counted as draws.
| Pos | Team | Pld | W | D | L | GF | GA | GD | Pts | Final result |
| 1 | Brazil | 6 | 4 | 2 | 0 | 10 | 4 | +6 | 14 | Gold medal |
| 2 | Spain | 6 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 9 | 5 | +4 | 11 | Silver medal |
| 3 | Mexico | 6 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 17 | 7 | +10 | 13 | Bronze medal |
| 4 | Japan (H) | 6 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 8 | 5 | +3 | 10 | Fourth place |
| 5 | South Korea | 4 | 2 | 0 | 2 | 13 | 7 | +6 | 6 | Eliminated in quarter-finals |
| 6 | New Zealand | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 0 | 5 | Eliminated in quarter-finals |
| 7 | Ivory Coast | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 7 | −2 | 5 | Eliminated in quarter-finals |
| 8 | Egypt | 4 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 0 | 4 | Eliminated in quarter-finals |
| 9 | Germany | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 6 | 7 | −1 | 4 | Eliminated in group stage |
| 10 | Argentina | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | −1 | 4 | Eliminated in group stage |
| 11 | Romania | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 4 | −3 | 4 | Eliminated in group stage |
| 12 | Australia | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 2 | 3 | −1 | 3 | Eliminated in group stage |
| 13 | France | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 5 | 11 | −6 | 3 | Eliminated in group stage |
| 14 | Honduras | 3 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 3 | 9 | −6 | 3 | Eliminated in group stage |
| 15 | Saudi Arabia | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 4 | 8 | −4 | 0 | Eliminated in group stage |
| 16 | South Africa | 3 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 3 | 8 | −5 | 0 | Eliminated in group stage |