2014 WC Brasil - CONCACAF WCQ opponents watch [all R's]

Not necessarily C'CAF related but Brazil - whom the US could meet in 2014 - fired Manu Menesez and rehired Big Phil Scolari.

The difference is that Manu played youngsters, Phil likes the vets.

LOL, that's virtually the same group we got last time. Just swap out Egypt for Japan.

And Jamaica drop their Caribbean Cup opener to French Guyana.

http://boxscorenews.com/french-guyana-turns-back-jamaica-in-caribbean-cup-p52071-68.htm

Hmm.

I guess French Guyana is going to be the Gold Cup 2013 version of Guadeloupe assuming they qualify.

Even without their full first choice squad, that's embarrassing.

So could Martinique. They are in the same group and beat Cuba in their first game. The top two from that group both qualify for the Gold Cup.

True. Although Martinique can also be the 2013 version of... ..Martinique. They have qualified to the Gold Cup before. (French Guyana has not).

Yesterday, in their 2nd group game of the Caribbean Cup, Jamaica drew 0-0 with Martinique:

Boyz in trouble: Caribbean Cup champs face exit after 0-0 draw

Wow..

You know......................based on good results in World Cup Qualifiers (see Jamaica 2 USA 1) and Gold Cup (see Jamaica 1 Honduras 0 ), Jamaica is ranked as the 4th best team in CONCACAF by FIFA.

And the roster they selected for this tournament is still good enough to win this Caribbean Cup outright. These are quite surprising results. At the CONCACAF minnow level, a team with forwards like Omar Cummings, Darren Mattocks, and Ryan Johnson should be scoring some goals against the likes of Martinique and French Guyana.

We should all want Jamaica to be at the Gold Cup...........................

So Jamaica faces a must win against Cuba or they don't go to the Gold Cup. Wow.

Why?

I want our players to be tested by the best teams possible..........................

Agreed.

But, why would any nation involved in the 2013 Hex also send their best team/players to the (relatively meaningless) 2013 Gold Cup?

Whomever advances to and qualifies for the 2013 Gold Cup will be "the best" opponents (by some definition) available for the US in that specific competition.

In last Gold Cup (last year) we faced Jamaica, which had its MLS and Euro based players, and we pretty much dominated the game from start to finish.

If they don't make the next one then the team that goes in their place should provide more or less the same level of test, for whatever that's worth. The U.S. is hardly going to suffer by their absence.

Agreed.

MLS is likely to "suffer" should Jamaica play in the 2013 Gold Cup, given the rosters and scheduling overlap.

Last GC we were playing for a Confederations bid. We had something to prove. This year, since it's "meaningless" it'd be nice for our youth/fringe players to have the best possible talent matchup.

Aside from that, there's no reason to want Jamaica to be there as a strictly USMNT fan.

can jamaica field a hex and gold cup teams of good enough value...

i see depth as their main hex problem, getting a gold cup squad with differenet players may aid the hex

but i stilll have tghem 6th and their performance, or lack there of shows why i don't have thwn higher than 6th...they some times dont show up, and in the hex it will kill them

Jamaica just lost to Cuba 1-0 and finished bottom of their group in the CC.

Somewhat shocking even if they were fielding a c-team. Only came away with 1 point from 3 matches.

So Jamaica is out of the Gold Cup, but I'm not sure if that helps them or hurts them in terms of World-Cup qualifying. Don't we expect them to have a much different squad in for WCQ games?

I am also not sure what it means for our WCQ chances, as our goal remains to take the full six points from Jamaica but hope they manage to take some points from our other Hex rivals.

i still think depth of squad is their weakness, and no gold cup means no free mathces to test talent

this is not good for them if usa had results like this fire everyone...

i think the boyz are way more pretender than anything

Can someone explain to me why they sent their B/C team and not their best eleven? I'm confused.

Because the competition wasn't on a FIFA date, so clubs have no obligation to release their players for the competition. They were able to bring in MLS, domestic, and Scandinavian based players because they are in their offseason. They did bring a bunch of regulars though, it wasn't just scrubs.

I'm afraid Jamaica never really took this thread seriously.

And possibly this as well.

Stupid for them to tank it, or not take it seriously. GC, even in a meaningless year, in the midst of WCQ is HUGE. You need ever chance to give people PT, too near-sighted, to not fight for the GC bid.

Maybe (or likely) they did fight for it.

Maybe they're just not very good.