Dates set for CONCACAF Gold Cup 2005

Is the Gold Cup going to be played every 2 years now? '91, '93, '96, '98, '00, '02, '03, '05. It would be nice to have some sort of order.

 

It's always been every two years -- they just moved it from a summer thing to a winter thing (making it 2 1/2 years later from '93 to '96 during that transition) and now moving it back (making it 1 1/2 years after '02 during this transition and putting it back on the original schedule).

 

Why can't be every four years like the rest of the world?

 

While Asia and Europe have theirs every four years, Africa, North America, Oceania, and South America have generally had theirs every two years, I believe. Copa America was talked into switching to an every-four-years format after the last Copa America (2001), but used to be every two.

CAF results: http://www.cafonline.com/competition/caf_competitions/nokia_nations_cup/Past_CAN_record_1.pdf

OFC history:
http://www.oceaniafootball.com/index.cgi?sID=43&intArticleID=415&det=1

CONMEBOL winners:
http://www.rsssf.com/tabless/sachamp.html

 

Forgot about Africa. Still no reason CONCACAF can't do it.

 

gotcha, as long as it stays the same time every other year I'll be happy

 

Having the Gold Cup every odd year means that 3 of every 4 years the MLS season is disrupted for national team committments. That's not good. Especially since the Gold Cup isn't on English-language TV.

 

My bet is that it will be rescheduled for lack of interest. There is too much football, both in the World and in the northern Americas at that time, including the Confederations Cup, World Youth Cup in Holland, and the World Cup Qualifying andthe World exhibition tours of the big Euro clubs.

The ideal time is in January 2007 when some of the Euro leagues have a break and the North American leagues are off-season. Then, CONCACAF can have a entrant for the 2007 Confederations Cup, if it still exists by then. If not, January 2008 would be a good practice run for the upcoming WCQ's about to start for 2010.

Having a Gold Cup in the dang middle of the WCQ hex is downright stupid, salacious and superfluous.

 

CONMEBOL has been able to pull it off for years now...

 

..but even they have changed the Copa America to every 4 years instead of every two, and moved it up to the same summer as the Euro finals to allow for both availability of players and to avoid the WCQ crunch time of the year before the WC. CONEMBOL is using a bit of reality, and I expect they will move the Copa up even one more year following the WC (ie:2007) to avoid conflict with it's 2 1/2 year WCQ qualifying campaign.

Either the continental championship has to be before the WCQ (like in Europe and Africa) or after the WCQ (like in Africa), otherwise it is in sports and financial cross-purposes. The timing of the 2003 Gold Cup was relatively good, it was just a stupidly organized competition.

 

No, I'm not saying it should, but there's no reason it can't fall in line with the majority of the world.

That and putting it in the middle of the key stage of WC qualifying is pretty dumb.

 

The Gold Cup movement was driven primarily by IFS; their hope has always been to replicate, with minimal effort, the 70,000 turout for that one US/Mexico final that one time. They predicated their entire commitment to Gold Cup around hoping that the gate would wander in, like that one time.

Now that IFS has been "replaced" by an in-house group of "marketing" people, one of the main ones of which is the former CEO of IFS (lol), look forward to more tinkering with the Gold Cup based upon doing as little as possible.

 

What's the IFS? Some marketing group that "ran" things for CONCACAF? Did Warner and fellow ratz have their fingers in that pie too?

 

I actually like it every 2 years. Gold Cup will never be as big as the European Championships which can be every 4 years because they are such a big deal.

 

IFS = InterForeverSports. They basically ran CONCACAF events such as the Gold Cup.

In what has to be some brilliance, the dates chosen aren't even FIFA dates.

On the other hand, isn't MLS the only league in action during that time? I thought the Mexican league and the various Centeral American leagues are in their off season at that time.

Sachin

 

While the specific dates aren't on FIFA's calendar, that calendar also says, "In addition to the above dates, confederations are authorized to make use of the period reserved for FIFA (June/July) and confederation competitions (January/February or June/July) to schedule official matches in accordance with their own needs." It says such dates must be sent to FIFA by the end of the prior year.

http://images.fifa.com/calendar/calendar_2004_2008_E.pdf

I think that means that call-ups for Gold Cup matches on those dates can be enforced. But, as you point out, there shouldn't be much conflict.

 

Copa America is being played every 3 years at this point

 

But I believe going forward it will be every four.

 

I'm most interested to learn what the venues will be. Traditionally, the games were held in places such as Miami and Los Angeles--US cities with big populations of Latinos. This was done for attendance reasons, but it also had the added benefit of being fair, since the US was at home but other teams from central america and the caribbean were in somewhat familiar settings (i.e., not Columbus in February) and had their fans also.

Since Mexico lost to us in the World Cup, they have hosted the Gold Cup and the Olympic qualifiers to restore their pride. So Mexico played in Mexico City in the last Gold Cup, against teams that had to fly back and forth from the USA, and now they can say, "We are the giants of Concacaf again." Mexican fans bought this crap and filled the stadiums.

 

I also want to talk about the size of the Gold Cup itself. Is there a tournament in the world with a greater disparity between the size of the trophy given to the winners (it's huge) and the actual importance of winning it (which is minimal)!?

I think I can remember Frankie Hey Dude hoisting the trophy in 2002. It seemed taller than him!

 

I remember there was a thread a little while ago discussing what other countries could host the Gold Cup. I would love to see Panama, Canada or some other nation host the cup. Their team would have a home field advantage. The problem is $$$. If CONCACAF wants money, they host it in the US or Mexico. The US can bring the most money due to the variety of ethnic groups in the country.

I look forward to the Gold Cup, the only two USMNT matches that I have attended were Gold Cup, US-ROK and US-ES.

 

I haven't been able to find anything official from COMENBOL, but I have seen several references to the 4 year switch.

example: http://www.footballculture.net/teams/feat_patriot.html

Has anybody a reference to an official announcement one way or another?

 

VENEZUELA IS SCHEDULED TO HOST NEXT IN 2007. AND I'LL BE IN PERU THIS SUMMER TO CHEER MY 'CAFETEROS' THRU...