These nations could debut at the 2026 World Cup

Thom Haye of Heerenveen.
Played for Netherlands U17, U19, U20, U21 then got called up for
Indonesia almost ten years since playing for Netherlands.

 

Agreed but CONCACAF won't get interesting for a long time. It has A LOT of teams most of which are minnows.... and then among the minnows there are minnows. Cuba vs Antigua is probably the only real question in the 2nd round. It won't get really fun until the 3rd round and that won't start until September of next year.

 

Hmm, I don't know, Curaçao has really good players (relatively speaking in the context
of Concacaf) and are managed by the great Dutchman Dick Advocaat. Cuco Martina
is a vastly experienced right-back defender and leader who has played in Holland and England's top leagues. It will be exciting to see who makes it from Concacaf to the World Cup. Jamaica have to be there, their players and fans would add so much to the carnival atmosphere that summer!

 

Jamaica finally seem to be getting it right. They should have held on to beat the USA, and they were easily the better side against Panama (who many regard as the best concacaf team beyond the Big 3)

All this while missing a number of key players.

Coach Halmgerson looks like a man on a mission.

I know Jamaica is not a debut, but it will be good to see them back at the WC with a competitive side.

 

Vietnam lost twice against Vietnam? Yeah, you know the situation is dire when you lose to yourself twice in a row Just kidding, I know you mean Indonesia. Ironically, this is 3 straight defeats to Indonesia if you include the Asian Cup match in January.... I also made a similar post earlier about where will the players come from for Vietnam? The VLeague is not that strong even by regional standards, with the Thai League probably being the dominant force there, and even the Malaysian and Indonesian league teams getting better now. So without the foreign imports it's basically just going to be local players from a relatively low-level league once the effects of the national youth team programs wear off....

 

Yea but I liked that they kept it local. They managed to create a good defensive side, that made it out of their group at the Asian Cup 2019, and made it to the last round of World Cup Qualifiers 2022.
Of course these type of teams live in cycles. They get a some good generations once in a while, and then they have to rebuild again. I just thought Vietnam had a couple of more years in Them.

 

Mali 2 Nigeria 0

We only had 4 starters but still an impressive performance from the Malians who have continued where they left off at the afcon.

I'd say they are the best team in the world to have never qualified for a World Cup.

Their time will surely come in 2026.

 

If only they'd done that against Central African Republic couple of months back....

 

I appreciate different opinions. To me Diaz right now for Colombia is playing about as great as any player on the planet.
Vini is great for Real Madrid. For Brasil not as much.

It can change. But Diaz was great in the last Copa America tied for the most goals. This year he is even better.

 

Surinam really is busy recruting Dutch for the Natio.
https://sportnieuws.nl/voetbal/nieu...18551043141/?referrer=https://duckduckgo.com/
20:55, 01-04-2024 / Last update: 23:31, 01-04-2024
Etienne Vaessen becomes international... of Suriname. And no, this is not an April Fool's joke. Vaessen can make his debut for Natio in June. That's because Vaessen is a quarter Surinamese. The goalkeeper of RKC has to compete with Warner Hahn, now goalkeeper at Kyoto Sanga in Japan.

 

Is there anybody who thinks it's unfair to countries in competition with Surinam and Curacao that don't have access to players developed by the Netherlands?

 

Suriname and Curaçao have each won a total of one game all-time at the CONCACAF Gold Cup, so their competitors seem to manage all right.

 

Surinam and Curacao are just at the starting line of fishing in Dutch players, Indonesia has discovered that source too, with the advantage that about 1.5 million Dutch have roots with Indonesia.

 

If CAN does it, then why other Concacaf members should not do it?

Plenty of CAN MNT players were developed by soccer leagues outside of CAN, if you look at those who saw action in 2022 WC qualifiers.

 

I wasnot saying they shouldnot, but given the reputation of the Dutch clubs in development, how many nations of concacaf have the same quality level source?

 

Jamaica is doing the same, and results are starting to pay off.

It's been going on in Africa for a while.

But even teams like Spain, Germany, Italy, who have won the world cup do it. Portugal does it.

It's just the way the world is these days.

 

Yeah, I'm an outlier in that respect.
I consider the Orange Squad the flagship of Dutch football, it stands for our achievements as a football nation. So I only want to see in that shirt players, who were formed from the beginning by our Dutch football culture, our football identity.
I even don't want Dutch players, who never set foot in our academies, how good they may be, to wear that shirt, with one exception.
I consider the Barcelona academy as thoroughly Dutch oriented, so Dutch players from there have enough "Dutch football culture" imprinted to get my pass.

Yeah, Spain recently couldnot wait to recrute an 18 yo Dutch talent, Dean Huijsen, by giving him a passport asap.
He, by the way wouldnot pass my "Dutch identity" test, as he as a 5 yo kid moved to Spain and went through the Spanish development system, so I'm actually fine with it.
I find it bizar however that a country like Spain, not only in this case, but also in the past, has to steep down to practices like this to fill selections with quality.
I'm someone who accepts it when the national team has a "drought" in certain positions.
I hate it if we would go down the path of recruting mercenaries.

 

Jamaica (UK ties), Canada, USA, Mexico, Haiti (French ties) all at a minimum have the capacity to match that talent pool. Panama, Costa Rica and Honduras all have historically produced enough domestically to be able to compete with the bigger fish in the region (USA, Canada, Mexico), and so should be able to hold up against Curacao and Suriname with reinforcements. Even the smaller Caribbean islands have access to the English diaspora. The DR is tapping deeper into its Spanish and American diasporas.

Really, all this does is allow Curacao and Suriname to step up a level and possible compete more evenly with nations like El Savador, Honduras, Jamaica, Haiti, etc. But these Dutch recruits aren't some sort of superweapon that gives them an unfair edge in the region. The recruits are solid, and enhance those sides, but they're not well above the talent level maintained by the current best 8-10 teams in the region.

I imagine it'll be the same with Indonesia - they'll find some decent Dutch 1st or 2nd tier professionals and upgrade their side, but that's not about to catapult them beyond the level of the better 10-12 sides in Asia. That might get them to the top of ASEAN, which is a big step up, but they won't be some super power in Asia off that. They'll merely become competitive.

I'd same the same about the Filipinos who are also making a really strong recruiting push in Europe and the USA.

This is a luxury view that only great football powers like Oranje can afford to maintain. The Surinamese, with far less in the way of financial resources, prestige/history, and population, have to get a bit more creative than that, especially when half of them don't even live in Suriname.

 

Found this in a USA thread.

 

My rankings have Comoros at #79

They are definately much better than FIFA and ELO have them.

They just have a tough group with Mali and Ghana, their current lead , I'm not sure how long it will last .

But they are probably the most improved team in CAF over the past 2 years. They've tapped into a large diaspora of players in France.