I'll admit it. I have had enough of Jack Warner running CONCACAF through his power base of Caribbean islands. Antigua and Barbuda and the Turks & Caicos would barely even qualify as towns inside of Mexico,the United States or Canada. His time is over and he should be thankful he is not in prison. So here is my proposal: Get rid of Warner and the Caribbean islands and let Slappy Jack form his own corrupt Caribbean union. Here is how it will look. The new CONCACAF will have 10 teams and qualifying for the World Cup will be like South American qualifying with a single set up of home and away games between the nations. Which nations? The ones that are not run by the Pirate of the Caribbean. Canada USA Mexico Guatemala Belize Honduras El Salvador Nicaragua Costa Rica Panama Gold Cup groupings can be figured out later and the Gold Cup will only be held once every 4 years. This 10 team set up is neat, tidy and best of all we don't have to listen to some venal clown down in Trinidad.
They will make their own confederation. God knows there are enough islands to make one up. Jack can have the whole Caribbean basin to lord over.
Jack Warner leaving CONCACAF and making an island confederation = 20% FIFA accepting the new confederation = 0% Adding more teams to the FIFA world cup = 10% Money decrease he will get = Priceless Point is: He won't even dare to move to another Confederation with the $$$ he is getting.
Why not go for the whole shebang and put Jack in charge of the Islands of Oceania and the Caribbean? Just a few time zone issues involved.
Probably not fair to Trinidad Tobago or Jamaica... To me, they do provide some competition and have some pretty talented players. However after that you're right. It's a pretty massive dropoff
My point is he won't have the choice. We tell all the crony Caribbeans that they are no longer part of a confederation that includes the 10 countries mentioned. The 10 countries simply split, like Mexico is rumored to be doing to CONCACAF. I think Mexico has had enough and the USA definitely has. Mexico and the USA provide the financial muscle. It is time for Mexico and the USA to have the political muscle.
if there was any way to do it that would be great. If they got a full spot, leaving us 2.5, that would be a good deal for the big islands. But it would suck for the central american countries and probably would result in missing the world cup for us occassionally. If the new islands confed only got the half spot they would have no hope. The real reform would be to have some version of wieghted voting. Its nuts that Antigua gets the same voting weight as the U.S. I think the stresses between the big clubs and FIFA and UEFA will eventually mean some reform, and I hope Gulati is thinking ahead and planning how to make Concacaf better when there is an opening.
One thing I'd love to see is all the English-speaking island nations forming a single federation, like the West Indies in cricket. It could instantly make CONCACAF a lot more competitive - a combined West Indies team might immediately be on par with the stronger Central American teams. Of course, Warner would never go for that, because he'd lose all his votes.
Why don't the US and/or Mexico attempt to take a leadership role in Concacaf? Sunil and co. don't appear to have the spine to stand up for our interests. I'm tired of reading nauseating articles like this one: http://blogs.reuters.com/soccer/2011/05/05/what-happens-in-concacaf-stays-in-concacaf/
Is there precedent under FIFA rules for such a move? I mean, what would prevent places like San Marino, Luxembourg, and Malta following suit saying "we're too small to compete on our own so we'll form one national team?" I know it's just an impossible hypothetical, but seriously I don't see how the Caribbean countries could pull that off.
Two things 1)Jamaica & Trinidad don't need to join with anybody to be competitive look at the records, Jamaica did well in the last pre hex, beating all those teams that you guys think they would need a merger to compete with. And we had a poor hex because of poor management and aging players it happens to all countries non U.S and Mexico. 2)Believe me we hate warner as much as you guys do for all the good hes done for us he has destroyed our football program since the world cup. Also ima let you guys in on a secret nobody likes Warner more than Gulati and the Mex prez. They are guaranteed money, world cup places and are very comfortable with Warner being there. They like what he does for their federations. So before you guys start throwing us out of our mutual federation why dont you guys throw your our representative out of his seat then you may start to see some changes.
The CFU countries have gotten two teams in the last four World Cups (Jamaica in 1998 and Trinidad and Tobago in 2006). One of these was during the first two of those World Cups when CONCACAF got 3 teams and the other was during the second two when CONCACAF got 3.5 teams. I don't think the CFU would deserve a whole spot.
It would not be Concacaf, It would be called CONCA. They do not want to do that, there is a thread about it in the Concacaf forum somewhere, most don't like the idea. 1. If you are Belize or Salvador; what do you prefer? A) A 10 team Confederation with 3 spots, where two spots will be taken by the USA and Mexico, so really 8 teams for 1 spot Or B) A 25 team confederation where the top teams are Jamaica and T&T for 1 World cup spot. 2. Does anyone remember the reason why CONCACAF was formed? More spots to the WC. If there is a split I have a feeling that CAF would keep the 1/2 spot, but the CONCA would not get 3 spots, more likely we would get 2.5 at most with the other half going somewhere else. (As punishment by FIFA, especially if Blater wins again). Amen to that, it is easier to blame an outsider (or the ref) than to blame your team.
I have wondered about this too. I always assumed that the Caribbean power base prevented the US or Mexico from taking a more dominant role.
Bingo. Anything to get out from under Jack Warner. I have a feeling the shit is about to hit the fan with Fifa and these allegations coming out of the English Parliament. Anything is possible.
The only shit that'll hit the fan is FIFA punishing the Home Associations for "governmental interference".
Don't think fifa will suspend the English F.A. regardless of how much "government interference" goes on. I still believe that if England,Spain,Italy and Germany collectively left fifa then the whole stack of cards would come crashing down on Warners noggin.
30 reasons Anguilla Antigua and Barbuda Aruba Bahamas Barbados Bermuda British Virgin Islands Cayman Islands Cuba Curaçao Dominica Dominican Republic French Guiana Grenada Guadeloupe Guyana Haiti Jamaica Martinique Montserrat Puerto Rico Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Saint-Martin Sint Maarten Suriname Trinidad and Tobago Turks and Caicos Islands U.S. Virgin Islands 1) The US/Mexico, etc. are powerless in CONCACAF against the Caribe voting block. We could get a couple of them to side with us, particularly Puerto Rico, US Virgin Islands, etc. But the rest are in the pocket of Warner. 2) Sepp Blatter and Warner would never allow Mexico and the US to leave CONCACAF. Sepp needs Warner to continue his role with CONCACAF.......because Sepp needs those CONCACAF votes to remain FIFA Prez. And as such Sepp wouldn't let the big-monied CONCACAF federations leave his buddy Warner's control. 3) People might suggest that Sunil disavow Warner and expose him as a crook, etc. What good does that do us really? Warner will remain head of CONCACAF, and will then be a very powerful enemy. We'd feel better about ourselves, but really wouldn't get ourselves anywhere productive.
As much as I hate Jack Warner, this post nails it. Mexico and the US will NEVER leave CONCACAF. Staying in our current federation assures us a WC berth every four years. Not to mention that the USSF makes a TON of money having the GC staged here every two years.
I'm of the opinion that if the US and Mexico joined CONMEBOL to make a 12 team confederation with 6 or 6.5 slots, the US' chances of missing a World Cup would barely decrease. I doubt it's THAT much money. And I wonder if the Fed would do better hosting Argentina and Brazil once every 4 years, not to mention hosting the occasional Copa Americas.
That's highly debatable. Even assuming that the US is in general one of the 6 or 7 most talented teams in your revised grouping (and I certainly think you could make that case), there are just too many roughly comparable teams competing for a limited number of spots for us to have anywhere near the kind of security we have at this point in time. Just consider that all of the 5 teams that most recently qualified from CONMEBOL outperformed the US and Mexico in this past World Cup, and this was one of our stronger showings (albeit probably one of their stronger showings as well). Here's how I'd break it down: CONCACAF currently have 0 elite teams and 2 second tier teams competing for 3.5 slots. In your proposed scenario, CONMEBOL would have 2 elite teams and IMO 7 second tier teams competing for 6 or 6.5 spots. That would leave (just as their format already does) at least two teams roughly (if not exactly) comparable to ours on the outside looking in at the end of each cycle. Even CONMEBOL's bottom teams are probably comparable to Honduras and Costa Rica and could threaten for a spot every odd cycle.