The 5th FIFA Futsal World Cup took place in Taiwan from November 21st to December 5th, 2004 . The 16 participating teams played the fifth futsal world champion in 40 games under the auspices of FIFA .
The Spanish team successfully defended the title with a 2-1 win in the final over Italy. The Brazilian team won the game for third place 7: 4 against Argentina. The Brazilian Falcão was named both top scorer and best player of the tournament.
Taiwan hosted the finals of a FIFA competition for the first time, although there was no experience of the sport before the tournament. Two halls in the greater Taipei area were selected as the venue .
The NTU Gymnasium of the National Taiwan University in Taipei was the main venue for the 5th Futsal World Cup. Twelve preliminary round and six intermediate round games as well as the semi-finals and finals took place in the university hall. Up to 3,500 spectators could watch the games.
The Linkou High School in the Linkou district of today's New Taipei served as the venue for twelve preliminary and six intermediate rounds. The hall can hold up to 15,000 spectators and is located in the immediate vicinity of Taiwan Taoyuan Airport . The venue is 15 kilometers outside of downtown Taipei.
Attendees
A total of 85 associations competed for the 15 final round places, 22 more than four years earlier. Taiwan to host was automatically qualified.
In Europe there were ten qualifying groups with three or four teams each, in which the group winners qualified for the play-off games. The winners of the five play-off games qualified for the finals. There were mostly no surprises, only Russia, fourth in the 2000 World Cup, failed in the first round to Bosnia-Herzegovina.
In South America, the qualifiers were determined as part of the Futsal South American Championship 2003 . All ten CONMEBOL members took part in the competition; South American champions and runner-up world champions Brazil, Argentina and Paraguay were able to qualify.
To the two places of the CONCACAF at the CONCACAF Futsal Championship 2004 were played. In addition to the United States, which won the tournament, Cuba also qualified again for the final tournament.
Once again there was only one place available for Africa. In a chaotic qualification with back and forth legs, during which four teams of eight registered teams withdrew, Egypt prevailed, which was the only team to compete in all rounds. The final opponent for the World Cup starting place and at the same time the African Championship was Mozambique, which had made it to the final without a fight.
In Asia, the participants were played during the 2004 Asian Futsal Cup in Macau. In addition to Iran, Japan and Thailand qualified. The Uzbek team just missed qualifying in fourth place. World Cup hosts Taiwan had already been eliminated from one of the four qualifying groups.
In Oceania there was a qualifying tournament in Canberra (Australia) at the end of July 2004, which was also the Oceania Championship. As in previous editions, Australia dominated the tournament and prevailed without losing points and 20-0 goals.
Only the host Taiwanese team took part in the finals of a FIFA Futsal World Cup for the first time in 2004.
The mode remained unchanged compared to the previous World Championships. The 16 teams initially played in four preliminary round groups of four teams each. Within each group, each team played against each other team. The two group best of each group qualified for the second group phase, in which the eight teams were again divided into two groups of four (two preliminary round winners and two preliminary round runners-up per group) and again played a game against each team. The two best in each group qualified for the semi-finals, which took place in the knockout system. If there was a tie during the group stage, the goal difference decided the placement.
The golden ball for the most valuable player of the tournament went to the Brazilian Falcão . The second and third best players of the tournament were Javier Rodriguez from Spain with the Silver Ball and the Italian Vinicius Bacaro with the Bronze Ball. The Brazilian Falcão also received the Golden Boot for the top scorer. His team mate Indio and the Spaniard Marcelo received the silver and bronze shoes respectively. The Fair Play Award went to the third consecutive year the team from Brazil.
Technical Report and Statistics: FIFA Futsal World Championship Chinese Taipei 2004 Technical Report ( PDF ; 8.8 MB) (English, French, Spanish, German)
Spain (2nd title)
Chinese Taipei
Falcão (13 goals)
yellow cards
Yellow-red cards
Red cards
Italy
Portugal
Czech Republic
Ukraine
Iran
Japan
Thailand
Argentina
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Paraguay
Cuba
United States
Egypt
Australia
