Some of the smaller island nations should combine their resources to from one team. Does Grenada, with a population comparable to a medium sized city, really have a much of chance in hell at making the Hexagonal, let alone the world cup? The solution: Combine the lesser antilles (perhaps save Trinidad) into one team, and gaurantee a spot on the team for each of the islands. That way, they can be somewhat competative. Of course, the impetus for such an action would lie with the islands themselves. If they are happy with their (sorry) lot, then so be it. Having a combined L. Antilles team would have the benefit of elmininating many if not all of the first wound games, and give more flexibility for possible play-in (tie-breaker?) (1/2 spot?) games against S. America. Go Wolfpack!
This is definitely an interesting concept. I believe that something like this is done in cricket (Windies)?
Skim through this thread. https://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=63378&perpage=15&pagenumber=1
Thanks DaMunk... Interesting posts from before. I can't believe some of the people in the other thread relate the state of the US team to the present situation of Barbados et al. It comes down to the simple issue of population, and the number of potential players. And related to that are the financial resources of the smaller countries...anyone remeber how Barbados almost quite playing in the last hexagonal due to lack of money? I suppose there is always the option of a country not even bothering to play. Perhaps FIFA should give the option of letting the very small countries (<100K-500K?) to pool their resources/players into one team.
It's an interesting thought. There's some precedent for combined teams: the CIS competed as a single team in Euro 1992 (and, of course, in several warm-up friendlies) after the Soviet Union qualified but broke up before the tournament. But I've thought, in fact, that this could be done both here and in Oceania, and might solve a lot of problems. My vision of this for CONCACAF goes as follows: the English-speaking West Indies (except T&T and Jamaica) compete as one unit in World Cup qualifying and in Gold Cup, but continue to compete as separate countries in Copa Caribe. I don't think a combined league is a good idea, because it would mean extremely high expenses, but a combined national team could be reasonably competitive in CONCACAF. The biggest advantage is reducing the length of CONCACAF World Cup qualifying dramatically, and generally making it easier to work with the rest of the world. Also, a combined national team would be able to train at a higher level, and the effects should carry over into local competitions - top players would improve the quality of the Copa Caribe, not only in the performance of the top players but in the training of individual teams. The Copa Caribe might even become a springboard for fringe players to get into the full West Indies team.
So basically you are saying that MLS is better b/c a few players on the US National Team play in the league??? That's a little backwards. Precedent is not set with the CIS competeing as they were formerly united under one flag. What you are suggesting is uniting indepent states under a common flag. Quite the opposite. Tha line about less qualification games is bogus too. The home-and-home play in round eliminates half of the weakest teams already. The other half, relatively speaking, aren't geographically similar and one could make an argument for cultural differences. With that in mind, why do people, who are not from the caribbean try to 'fix' a problem which exists as a result of their own creation, by lumping a number varied and diverse independent states together to be dealt with as one unit? As far as YOUR vision...I fear Jack Warner less than I fear you and your ideas.