{"id":761693,"date":"2026-06-26T14:15:11","date_gmt":"2026-06-26T14:15:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/761693\/"},"modified":"2026-06-26T14:15:11","modified_gmt":"2026-06-26T14:15:11","slug":"uruguay-u20-set-for-junior-world-championship-opener-against-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/761693\/","title":{"rendered":"Uruguay u20 set for Junior World Championship opener against South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"

Uruguay u20 is set to square-off against South Africa in their opening match at the 2026 Junior World Championship in Georgia. Los Teritos will face the Baby Boks at Tbilisi\u2019s Avchala Stadium on Saturday in a Pool A match. Uruguay and South Africa are joined by Georgia and Wales in Pool A. South Africa were tournament winners in 2012 and 2025 while Wales were runners-up in 2013.<\/p>\n

Uruguay are back in the World Rugby Junior World Championship for the first time since their appearance in 2009 in which Los Teritos were relegated back to the World Rugby U20 Trophy.<\/p>\n

The 2009 edition of the tournament saw Uruguay facing powerhouse opponents New Zealand, Ireland and Argentina in that order. Uruguay was overwhelmed first-up, losing 75-0 against New Zealand. Los Teritos then put on two much better performances in losing 16-11 to Ireland and 33-15 to Argentina.<\/p>\n

In more recent years, Uruguay has shown genuine progress both at the Senior Men\u2019s level and also in the u20\u2019s. In addition to World Cup wins over Fiji<\/a> and Namibia<\/a> in 2019 and 2023, a notable national achievement occurred in 2023 when Uruguay defeated Scotland 37-26 in Nairobi, Kenya during the World Rugby u20 Trophy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The Uni\u00f3n de Rugby del Uruguay (URU) have invested heavily in youth for their professional franchise team roster in Super Rugby Americas (SRA). This is clear with 17 out of the 23 named to play against South Africa having received game time in SRA 2026 for Pe\u00f1arol.<\/p>\n

The 17 are Justo Ferrario, Mateo Acosta, Nicol\u00e1s Pittaluga, Sebasti\u00e1n P\u00e9rez, Juan Francisco Bessio, Nicol\u00e1s Mattsson, Pedro Su\u00e1rez, Alex Sonneveld, Manuel Ponte, Dario Rodr\u00edguez, Sebasti\u00e1n Dalmao Rivero, Guillermo Curuchet, Ignacio Merli, Mateo Ibarburu, and Juan Francisco Pereira.<\/p>\n

Ferrario scored 90 points in the season. He was the first-choice fly half despite being a teenager. The investment in his future follows his test debut for Uruguay against Portugal<\/a> in November 2025. He played center against Portugal that day as one of three debutants. One of the others was Jean Cotarmanac\u2019h. His brother, Pierre Cotarmanac\u2019h is on the bench against South Africa.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\" LINE-UP<\/p>\n

\"\"
URUGUAY
1 Germ\u00e1n Gonz\u00e1lez, 2 Sebasti\u00e1n P\u00e9rez, 3 Juan Francisco Bessio, 4 Nicol\u00e1s Mattsson, 5 Piero Veglio, 6 Pedro Su\u00e1rez, 7 Alex Sonneveld, 8 Manuel Ponte (capt.), 9 Mateo Ibarburu, 10 Justo Ferrario, 11 Bruno Primavesi, 12 Vicente Alvarez, 13 Mateo Acosta, 14 Bruno Baccino, 15 Nicol\u00e1s Pittaluga<\/p>\n

Replacements: 16 Jos\u00e9 Candia Sciarra, 17 Dario Rodr\u00edguez, 18 Sebasti\u00e1n Dalmao Rivero, 19 Guillermo Curuchet, 20 Ignacio Merli, 21 Pierre Cotarmanac\u2019h, 22 Juan Francisco Pereira, 23 Joaqu\u00edn Fresnedo<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\" URUGUAY POOL FIXTURES \u2013 JUNIOR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP<\/p>\n

South Africa U20 vs Uruguay U20 \u2013 Saturday, June 27, 2026 (Avchala Stadium, Tbilisi)
\nWales U20 vs Uruguay U20 \u2013 Thursday, July 2, 2026 (Avchala Stadium, Tbilisi)
\nGeorgia U20 vs Uruguay U20 \u2013 Tuesday, July 7, 2026 (Avchala Stadium, Tbilisi)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Uruguay u20 is set to square-off against South Africa in their opening match at the 2026 Junior World…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":761694,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85,321217,340295],"class_list":["post-761693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-u20","tag-world-rugby-u20s"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761693","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=761693"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/761693\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/761694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=761693"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=761693"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=761693"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}