FRISCO, Texas (Wednesday, March 31, 2010) - The FC Dallas U16 Juniors will travel today to the Netherlands for a week long trip to compete in the prestigious AEGON Future Cup taking place April 3-5 at the AFC Ajax professional facility in Amsterdam.

The only North American team competing, FC Dallas will join AFC AJAX (Netherlands), FC Barcelona (Spain), Liverpool FC (England), China U-17 (China), FC Bayern Munich (Germany), AC Milan (Italy) and RSC Anderlecht (Belgium) in tournament play.

Holding first place within their U16 division, and following an impressive performance in the USSF Development Academy, Major League Soccer selected the FCD Juniors to represent the league and accept the invitation extended by Ajax. "This is a prestigious event and we are proud to have FC Dallas represent the League," explained Nelson Rodriguez, Executive Vice President of Major League Soccer. "We know they will be excellent ambassadors and anticipate that their play will be impressive as well."

The FC Dallas Juniors will open group play against RSC Anderlecht on Saturday, April 3 with continued group play against AC Milan and FC Bayern Munich on Sunday, April 4. Upon the conclusion of group play, points will determine the tournament's final day pairings on April 5. All games and all FCD team training will occur at the AFC Ajax facility in Amsterdam.

"We are honored to have been invited to participate in the Aegon Future Cup this year," said Chris Hayden, Director of Coaching for FC Dallas Youth. "MLS decided to extend the opportunity to FC Dallas based on the quality of our team and the style of play that we bring to the field. This tournament will expose our young players to high level competition on an international stage and will provide our team a tremendous developmental experience."

The team will be joined by Head Coach Oscar Pareja, Director of Player Development, Coach Hayden, and Coach Chris Clarke, Director of Academy Player Development.

Also traveling with the team is both former FC Dallas professional player Bobby Rhine, and Katie Solomon Edgar, Director of Youth Soccer Business, who will be discussing expansion of the FC Dallas International Business and Partnership Program with the foreign clubs in attendance. According to Edgar, "FC Dallas views this tournament as not only an opportunity to showcase our best Juniors players on the pitch against top level international competition, but also as an opportunity for the cultural enrichment and personal development of our players. Whether it be training in Brazil with one of our partner teams like Clube Atletico Paranaense, or traveling to Europe for prestigious tournament play like the Future Cup, we intend on continuing to expose our players to the best competition possible, worldwide."

For tournament updates, travel news, blog posts, and exclusive footage from Amsterdam, follow the team at <http://www.fcdallasyouth.com/> www.fcdallasyouth.com <http://www.fcdallasyouth.com> <http://www.fcdallasyouth.com> or at <http://twitter.com/FCDallasWeb> http://twitter.com/FCDallasWeb <http://twitter.com/FCDallasWeb>

FC Dallas Juniors Traveling Roster:
Caleb Underwood, Eduardo Cortes, Mark Ashby, Nicholas Rochowski, Alex Frankenfeld, Michael Ambrose, Christian Garcia, Ryan Ward, Flavio Guzman, Jose Gamino, Danny Garcia, Jack Coleman, Kevin Machado, Marco Carrizales, Emerson Hyndman, Boyd Okuono, Alfred Koroma, Jairo Villalta, Jonathan Top