Flag football, new Olympic sport, debuts at Panama 2026: Argentina squad | OneFootball

Among the 22 disciplines at the 2026 South American Youth Games in Panama, there is one that is little known to the general Argentine public. It is flag football, a form of American football with no contact or tackles, which entered the Olympic scene when it was chosen as one of the five sports to be added to the program for Los Angeles 2028 and is now making its debut at the continental event for athletes between 14 and 17 years old.

In Panama, medals will be awarded in both the women’s and men’s divisions, in a four-team tournament whose participants were invited to the event (in South America, youth national teams are only just beginning to take shape) and with Argentina in the field. The sky-blue-and-white team did not have much time to prepare for this competition, but it is still aiming high.

“The invitation and the inclusion in the South American Games came a bit close to the deadline, so we didn’t have as much time to work as I would have liked,” Juan Manuel Sesto, Team Leader at these Games and president of the FAA, the national federation for the sport, explained in an interview with Clarín.

“We have many kids playing in our flag football league, so many of the national team members came from there. And some others joined who discovered the sport at that time and, once they started to understand it, never stopped. A really nice group came together, and they’ve been training continuously since December,” he added.

The tournament will be played in a single group, with home-and-away round-robin matches and five-player teams. The team that finishes first in the standings will then face the fourth-place team in one semifinal, while the second and third-place teams will meet in the other. The podium will be decided on Sunday with a third-place game and the gold-medal match.

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The objective in each game is to score as many points as possible through a touchdown, which consists of carrying the ball into the end zone. And since there is no contact, instead of bringing down an opponent to prevent a score, it is enough to pull off one of the bands (or flags) tied to either side of their waist.

Argentina will face Uruguay this Friday at 10 a.m., Brazil at 1:45 p.m., and Panama, one of the continental powers, at 6:45 p.m. On Saturday, they will first take on Brazil again (11:15 a.m.), then the hosts (3 p.m.), and close out against Uruguay (5:30 p.m.).

“The reality is that we don’t know much about the other countries, but the kids are learning very quickly. The first two days will be key for growth and for correcting mistakes. Our goal is to make the medal table and bring a medal back to Argentina,” Sesto said.

A strong performance by the young Argentines could boost the development of a sport that has been played in the country for a long time, despite not being very well known—there are teams and competitions in Buenos Aires, Mar del Plata, Rosario, Córdoba, Mendoza, Concepción del Uruguay, Paraná, and Tucumán—and which has been growing steadily year after year.

“The sport hooks you once you start to understand it,” Sesto said. “It’s appealing because of the style of play, it has a lot of strategy, and it’s easy to play. You need a ball, some flags attached at the sides with a belt, and that’s it. You don’t need that much space either. People of all ages can play it. And it’s pretty simple.”

As the president of the FAA explained, flag football arrived in Argentina between 1993 and 1994, although in different formats (with more contact) than the one that will be Olympic in two years. But after the pandemic it began to grow much more, and that association started promoting the “5-on-5” format that will debut at Los Angeles 2028.

“From that moment on, there was vertical growth. And although we had already represented the country in other formats in international tournaments, in 2022 the path of the flag national team as it is played today began. That year we played in the South American Championship in Brazil, where we were runners-up. Then we took part in a continental tournament in Charlotte, United States, where we finished fifth, a great result; and at the World Championship in Finland in 2024 (Editor’s note: Third in the group with a 1-2 record). And last year we played in the continental tournament in Panama, where we were neck and neck with Brazil,” added the man who is now in Panama accompanying the Argentine players.

At the South American level, Argentina is battling Brazil shoulder to shoulder for first place. “We have competed against Chile, Uruguay, Colombia and we were able to beat them. But with Brazil, we’re right there—our games are always even, tight,” Sesto explained. At the continental level, Panama, Mexico, the United States, and Canada hold a huge advantage because they are the founders of the sport and have a more deeply rooted culture around it. Even so, Argentina has been “growing on the technical and athletic side and in the sport’s grassroots,” and “closing the gap with the strongest countries.”

The 12 young players, aged 15 and 16, carrying the Argentine flag at the South American Games are Francisco Steinborn, Lucas Seeling, Felipe Lisazo, Valentino Volgin, Daniel Argerich, Valentín López Bige, Benjamín Viale, Isao Gil, Mateo Liatti, Santino Catena, Joaquín Sueiro Martín, and Tomás Bosco. Several of them have strong potential looking ahead to Los Angeles 2028. Not to go for qualification next year, since they must be 18 or older for that, but perhaps to join the senior national team if a ticket to the Games is secured—the ultimate dream of Argentine flag football.

“You can dream. It’s nice to have that carrot out in front to chase. The reality is that it’s very difficult, but we don’t think about it that way,” Sesto admitted.

“Next year is vital for us, because the Continental that qualifies for the Olympic Games will be played. It’s difficult, but not impossible. We’ve been preparing for several years and I think we’ll be up to the level of the competition. We’re going to try to arrive at that tournament in our best form, compete, and see what happens. There’s always a chance, and we’re going all the way. Hopefully it happens, and if not, we’ll know we gave our best. Brazil and Argentina are relatively new countries in the sport, but we know we’re on the right path,” he concluded.

This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇪🇸 here.