The Copa America Centenario is right around the corner. This tournament is special because, not only is the Copa America the oldest international soccer tournament in the world, but this summer will be its 100th anniversary, taking place in the United States and including 16 national teams from the Americas: 10 from CONMEBOL and six from CONCACAF, including the USA and El Tri.
This is a dramatic change from the tournament's typical 12 team format, with 10 South American teams and two invitees that are usually from CONCACAF. The most-often invited team, Mexico, will need to bring its best this summer in order to compete against the likes of Argentina's Lionel Messi, Chile's Alexis Sanchez and Brazil's Neymar. For soccer fans, you may be enjoying winter right now but start looking forward to what summer has in store.
Mexico will head Group C. This means it’ll avoid facing the United States (head of Group A), Brazil (head of Group B) and Argentina (head of Group D) in the group stages. The draw for the remaining spots will take place at a later time. There are 10 teams in the CONMEBOL Confederation.
From there, seeded teams will be fearing the current Copa America holders, Chile, and Colombia, who are the eighth best team in the world, according to the FIFA rankings. Not to be forgotten is Luis Suarez and Uruguay, who won the 2011 Copa America. They will be another team to dread. The full representatives from CONMEBOL are Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Uruguay, Bolivia, Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay, Peru and Venezuela.
From the CONCACAF side, the teams to fear will most likely be Jamaica and Costa Rica. Jamaica had a strong showing in the Gold Cup, losing to El Tri in the final, and they also won the 2014 Caribbean Cup. Costa Rica have qualified as winners of the Copa Centroamericana and have a strong squad. The other two spots will be filled in playoff matches that include Panama vs. Cuba and Trinidad and Tobago vs. Haiti.
Another exciting thing about the tournament is that this edition will be the first time it’s hosted outside of South America. The tournament will be held in 10 stadiums in the United States.
The following are the host cities: Seattle, Washington; Orlando, Florida; Foxborough, Massachusetts; Santa Clara, California; East Rutherford, New Jersey; Houston, Texas; Pasadena, California; Chicago, Illinois and Glendale, Arizona.
What does the tournament have in store for Mexico? Head Coach Juan Carlos Osorio will most likely select the best players for the tournament. He won’t be faced with the issue of having to pick two squads for two separate tournaments. This means Mexico will hopefully put on a better showing in the Copa America than they have in the last two editions, with Mexico failing to make it out of the group stage in both of those.
This has to do not only with facing strong opposition in the tournament, but also because they failed to send their best players. Osorio will have no excuse this time around. He’ll have to take Chicharito, Andres Guardado, Carlos Vela and other El Tri players who are performing strongly this year.
Since the tournament is being held in the United States, El Tri will also have the benefit of a somewhat home field advantage. There are a lot of El Tri fans in the United States compared to South America and this will likely motivate the team to go further than they ever have in the tournament.
The dates for Mexico’s first three matches are: June 5 (Glendale, Arizona), June 9 (Pasadena California) and June 13 (Houston Texas).
