Toronto was included as a Host City, which made me wonder if Concacaf could spread the competition out. This lead to a bunch of ideas I will list below. Feel free to comment, add more ideas, etc. - 16 teams: 3 N.Am., 7 C.Am., 6 Caribbean - 4 groups of 4, each group with 3 venues each (12 stadia, 2 games each) - Knock-out stages with different venues (4 stadia, 2 games each) - 16 stadia in total: 3 from Mexico (Tijuana, Monterrey and Torreón); 3 from Canada (Vancouver, Toronto, Montreal); 10 from the US. - One group could be held at Tijuana, LA and Sacramento/San Jose; another at Torreón, Monterrey and Dallas; a third on Vancouver, Seattle and Portland; a fourth in Toronto, Montreal and Foxborough. - The other 4 venues would be all American, I know, but perhaps: New York, Foxborough, Chicago and Miami. - The venues could rotate, although I believe Northern Mexico would be mandatory. What do you think?
Belize and Nicaragua don't deserve automatic entry, and giving UNCAF 7 spots for 7 teams would leave there no reason to have the Copa Centroamericana. I wish the countries in CONCACAF were better, but given their quality I don't want the Gold Cup to expand to 16.
Ditto. For now, giving the Caribbean a shot at a fifth berth (given how Guadeloupe and Martinique have acquitted themselves in the Gold Cup beyond the Caribbean's typical Big 4) was the only adjustment that needed to be made. But looking at how the likes of Belize, Nicaragua and Grenada have fared, 12 is the correct size for now.
There is no reason for the CCA, regarding the Gold Cup, currently. After all, for Nicaragua or Belize to win a spot is extremely rare.
But I agree pushing to 16 would make quality go down. The biggest idea was not increasing the number of teams, but spreading the Gold Cup throughout North America. One thing that could be done to increase perceived quality is to add a second group stage with eight teams. Then, group winners would go to the final, runners-up to 3rd place match (like the 1978 World Cup). --- Another way would be dividing the 16 teams in two pools of eight, and those pools into two groups of 4 each. It works similarly, but allows semifinals with 7 matchdays. a. First round, group stage (3 games): round robin within the group, top-2 advance. b. Second round, pool stage (2 games): teams from one group play against teams from the other within the pool. The points from the match played in group stage between qualified teams is maintained. Top-2 from the pool advance. c. Semifinals: Winner Pool A v. Runner-Up Pool B; Winner Pool B v. Runner-Up Pool A.
Nicaragua qualified for Gold cup 2009, and now that Central American went down from 5 to 4.5 Gold Cup spots there's no guarantee that all of Costa Rica, Panama, Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador will qualify. The Copa Centroamericana also provides bragging rights and FIFA Ranking points. Considering it's during the MLS season, MLS clubs wouldn't want to lose players for a tournament that requires 7 games to win which is as many as the World Cup. If the Gold Cup expanded to 16 I would rather it have same Group Stage-Quarterfinals-Semifinals-Final format as the Euro. If there were 6 countries I might agree with you, but with 7 countries it would take 7 matchdays with each country having 1 matchday off, and that's an increase of 2 matchdays over the current format. Your Gold Cup and Copa Centroamericana ideas might work for basketball which requires less rest between games, but I think they would make soccer tournaments take too long.
It could be spread out during the year, using FIFA dates currently for friendlies. That could not be necessary an issue.
FIFA dates are in pairs, so 7 matchdays would require four months of FIFA dates or having teams play three times close together to do it in three months. If it was entirely in the USA, each country would have to make three or four trips to the USA. Alternatively, it could be done round-robin with each country having three home games and three away games. If Central America was going to do Gold Cup qualifying like that I would rather them just do qualifying groups of four teams mixed between Central America and the Caribbean.
I prefer not to mix. I still dream to turn CFU into the Caribbean Football Confederation, but that is another subject entirely.
I do agree that Nicaragua and Belize should not warrant automatic birth, however Nicaragua and Belize are slowly picking up there games...In this CCA there was no flogging or easy victories as it was in previous editions