Host country Portugal Dates 9–15 March Runners-up United States | City Algarve Champions Germany (1st title) | |
Teams 11 (from 3 confederations) | ||
The 2006 Algarve Cup is the 13th edition of the Algarve Cup, an invitational women's football tournament held annually in Portugal. It took place 9-15 March 2006. Eleven teams participated in this edition of the Algarve Cup. Germany won the tournament defeating the USA, 4-3, in the final-game. Sweden ended up third defeating France, 1-0, in the third-prize game.
Contents
Format
The eleven teams are split into three groups that played a round-robin group stage, with 4 teams each in Group A and Group B, and 3 teams in Group C.
The format for this edition of the Algarve Cup is as follows: Groups A and B, containing the strongest ranked teams, are the only ones in contention to win the title. The group A and B winners contest the final - to win the Algarve Cup. The runners-up play for third place, and those that finish third in the groups play for fifth place. The teams in Group C played for places 7–12. The winner of Group C played the team that finished fourth in Group A or B (whichever has the better record) for seventh place. The Group C runner-up played the team who finishes last in Group A or B (with the worse record) for ninth place. The team that finished last in Group C does not participate in the play-off stage.
Points awarded in the group stage followed the standard formula of three points for a win, one point for a draw and zero points for a loss. In the case of two teams being tied on the same amount of points in a group, their head-to-head result determined the higher place.