History
1990s
The under-23 era for Pakistan began in the early 1990s when men’s Olympic football was reformed as an under-23 competition for the 1992 Barcelona Games (with the "three over-age players" allowance added from 1996). Prior to that in earlier Olympic qualifiers, where many teams played under amateur eligibility with no age cap, Pakistan like many Asian countries fielded their senior national team in the 1964 and 1988 qualifiers editions. Asia later aligned some regional events, the Asian Games adopted the U-23 with over-age format in 2002, [2] and the South Asian Games did so in 2004. [3]
Within this new framework, Pakistan entered 1992 Summer Olympics Qualifiers, finishing bottom of a group with Yemen, Qatar, the UAE and Iran. [4] The side also took part in the 1996 Summer Olympics Qualifiers but did not register a win and went out in the preliminary rounds.
2000s
The under-23 side participated at the 2002 Asian Games in Busan, South Korea. They were put into a group with Kuwait, North Korea and Hong Kong, losing all matches. [5] The next year they also lost in both legs against Syria at the 2004 Summer Olympics Qualifiers.
The under-23 side won the gold medal at the 2004 South Asian Games held across 3 venues in Pakistan from March 28 to April 6, 2004. The tournament was the first to introduce an under-23 tournament system for the football events. [3] Muhammad Essa ended the tournament as top scorer and was player of the tournament, and helped Pakistan win the gold medal. [6] His goal in the semi final against Sri Lanka which ultimately ended in a 1-1 draw until the penalty shootout took Pakistan all the way to the final against India, where Abdul Aziz's goal gave Pakistan a 1–0 victory. [7]
In the 2006 South Asian Games held across in Colombo, Sri Lanka from 14 to 26 August 2006, Pakistan again won the gold medal. [8] After advancing from the group stages, Essa's strike against Nepal led Pakistan to the final against Sri Lanka, which ended in a victory for the Green Shirts thanks to a goal by Adeel Ahmed in the half time. [8] However, at the 2006 Asian Games, Pakistan failed to advance past group stage.
In 2007, Pakistan thrashed Singapore in both the home and away legs by 2–1 and 3–2, consecutively under the newly appointed head coach Muhammad Rasheed, and won the preliminary round of 2008 Summer Olympics first time in the history of Olympics. [9]
2010s
In 2010, the team failed to advance past group stage at both 2010 South Asian Games and the 2010 Asian Games. In 2011, after a tour to Thailand, the team played at the 2012 Summer Olympic Qualifiers against Malaysia, and also played in a two-match test series against Palestine in March 2011. [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15]
The next year, the team featured in the 2012 Palestine International Cup, [16] 2013 AFC U-22 qualification and the Mahinda Rajapaksa Trophy in Sri Lanka. [17]
In 2014, the team featured again in the 2014 Palestine International Championship, and later played a friendly against the Indonesia senior team. [18] [19] [20] [21] [22] The team subsequently failed to get past the group stage at the 2014 Asian Games. The next year the team played at the 2016 AFC U-23 qualification in the United Arab Emirates.
The team missed international exposure for the next 3 years, due to internal crisis within the Pakistan Football Federation, and the consequent suspension by FIFA on 10 October 2017. FIFA restored membership of PFF on 13 March 2018. [23] With the 2018 Asian Games approaching in August, the team had very little time to prepare. PFF announced the signing of new Brazilian coach José Antonio Nogueira the team flew to Indonesia. On 14 August 2018, the team played its first group game against Vietnam, which resulted in a 3–0 loss. On 16 August 2018, the team faced a loss against Japan by a scoreline of 4–0. Pakistan defeated Nepal by 2–1 in their final group game which was the former's first win in Asian Games after 44 years. [24] [25]
This page is based on this
Wikipedia article Text is available under the
CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
Pakistan 0–1 Yemen 
Gold Medal (2004, 2006)
