Ecuador

Ecuador 2003-05 Home

Now here is a nice shirt. Stripes with the colours of the flag, and interesting pattern of curves across the body of the shirt to avoid any plainness. The badge is a nice material too but no patterns on the back of the shirt (some slight stripes) as well as plain sleeves do take away from the experience slightly. The authenticity tags are also interesting, with two of them tied together.

Qualification for the 2006 World Cup went very well in this design, with Ecuador being comfortably qualified, despite 2 draws in their final qualification games. Their away record was poor but strong home performances took them through. They also wore it for the 2004 Copa America where they lost all 3 games to crash out. A 6-1 loss to Argentina and 2-1 losses to Uruguay and Mexico ranked them as the worst side in the tournament which is harsh on the shirt, if nothing else.

Up until 1998 World Cup qualification, Ecuador has rarely achieved much in CONMEBOL, with 2 victories from 5 games in 1966 qualification being their best performance. They completely turned this around as qualification opened up into the now familiar giant round robin stage and have qualified for 3 of the 6 world cups since! 2006 proved their most successful outing, where they reached the knockout stages, only to get dumped out by David Beckham’s free kick. Otherwise the match was so memorable that all I can remember is that he was also sick on the touchline. Not quite Gary Lineker but impressive enough. In the Copa America, Ecuador have hosted it 3 times and done their best then, with 2 4^th places. Otherwise their performances have been unremarkable with only 16 wins from 121 games… 4 Pan American Games appearances are capped by a 2007 gold medal though where somehow a tournament with Brazil, Argentina and Colombia involved had Mexico, Jamaica, Bolivia and Ecuador in the semi-finals!

Their women’s side is generally unremarkable too, with a World Cup appearance in 2015 (1 goal scored, 17 conceded) after a good qualifying performance was capped by an intercontinental play-off victory vs Trindad and Tobago. Their highlight was a 1-0 loss to eventual finalists Japan. Otherwise, a 3^rd and a 4^th place in the Copa América Femenina in 1998 and 2014 (as hosts) respectively are their standout moments, with no participation in the pan American games thus far. Youth football has been a brighter spot, with the U20s having a successful 2019 (3^rd at the World Cup and South American champions) as well as several other World Cup qualifications under their belt. The U17’s have a string of 3^rd and 4^th places in CONMEBOL and 5 World Cup qualifications though the U23s and U15s haven’t been as successful. Women’s youth football has sadly only been repeated group stage appearances in CONMEBOL except for 1 3^rd place many years ago.

Male and female futsal (yeah, South America’s keen) are not highlights for Ecuador except for one or two highlights that otherwise stand out. Neither senior nor youth futsal have shown any consistent success and they typically compete it out amidst the bottom nations. Beach soccer is much more exciting, although 3^rd and 4^th places tend to be their lot, partly because how do you get close to Brazil?

Ecuador might struggle in 2022 World Cup qualification as most of CONMEBOL do due to the sheer size of the qualifiers. However, without standout players their expected position is around the play-off spot so I suppose we’ll have to see.