So How Does This CONCACAF Olympic Qualifying Thing Work?

By: Laurie | March 10th, 2008

Last week when I started planning to write about the nuts and bolts of CONCACAF Olympic qualifying, I figured it would be a simple cut ‘n’ paste affair. I was wrong. I could not find one single source that explained how it works. This means that we could be a legitimate source of news here.

(You have no idea how this recent aura of Offside legitimacy frightens me.)

But I digress. The tournament that determines the Olympic qualifying berths for the CONCACAF region officially gets under way this week. And the battle for those slots isn’t quite like any other.

First off, this is the Olympics. In most other sports, the Olympics are the pinnacle of sports achievement, and the players are the best of the best of the best in their sports.

In soccer, though, we have World Cup for that. So beginning with the 1992 games, the powers that be decided that the Olympics would be a U-23 thing, and that all players must be Olympic virgins. No previous Olympic experience allowed.

Except not quite. The games weren’t well attended in 1992, so starting in 1996 each team was allowed three “wild card” players — players who were either over-age or who had already competed in an Olympics. Or both.

But we can’t make things too easy for the teams. So these wild card players can’t be used during qualifying; they can be brought in only after the qualifiers, when teams have already qualified for the Olympic games. This makes positions like goalkeeper particularly interesting, since keepers tend to be older and more experienced in general. There’s a good chance that the goalkeeper who takes the team all the way through qualifying won’t see a minute of play in the Olympics.

The actual process of qualifying is done by regions, similar to World Cup. Daryl has the list of the teams who have already qualified here, by region. What’s missing from his list, of course, are the two CONCACAF slots, which haven’t been decided yet.

In CONCACAF qualifying, there are two qualifying groups. And since there are two qualifying slots, one might think that the winner of each group would advance to the Olympics. That’s not the case. It wouldn’t be fair to have any team get to the Olympics simply by the luck of the draw — through having the easier qualifying group — so the top two qualifiers from each group advance to the knockout playoff rounds. (Plus playoffs get better TV ratings than group games. Although I’m sure that never has anything to do with any decision, ever.)

So to sum up, what we have in CONCACAF qualifying are three group games per team, with the top two from each group advancing to the semis. The two winners of the semi-final games automatically qualify for the Olympics, but they play the final for pride and the CONCACAF U-23 Champions title.

For the US, Coach Peter Nowak* officially named his final roster yesterday. (List of names is at the bottom.) The US is in qualifying Group A along with Cuba, Panama and Honduras.

After playing Cuba in their opening game on March 11, the U.S. will face Panama on March 13 at 8 p.m. ET and then finish Group A play against Honduras on March 15 at 7 p.m. ET. All three U.S. matches will be the second match of three doubleheaders played at Raymond James Stadium and will be broadcast live on Fox Soccer Channel and ESPN Deportes.

Group B features Canada, Guatemala, Haiti and Mexico facing off on March 12, 14 and 16 at The Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif. LP Field in Nashville will host the semifinals on Thursday, March 20. The top two teams from Group A and B will move on to the semifinals in Nashville, Tenn., where the winners will earn berths to the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing.

The twenty players who made the United States’ CONCACAF U-23 team for this week’s tournament are:

Roster by Position
GOALKEEPERS (2): Dominic Cervi (out of contract), Chris Seitz (Real Salt Lake)
DEFENDERS (7): Hunter Freeman (New York Red Bulls), Kamani Hill (Vfl Wolfsburg), Patrick Ianni (Houston Dynamo), Michael Orozco (San Luis), Jonathan Spector (West Ham United), Nathan Sturgis (Real Salt Lake), Marvell Wynne (Toronto FC)
MIDFIELDERS (7): Freddy Adu (SL Benfica), Maurice Edu (Toronto FC), Eddie Gaven (Columbus Crew), Stuart Holden (Houston Dynamo), Sacha Kljestan (Chivas USA), Dax McCarty (FC Dallas), Sal Zizzo (Hannover 96)
FORWARDS (4): Jozy Altidore (New York Red Bulls), Chad Barrett (Chicago Fire),
Charlie Davies (Hammarby IF), Robbie Findley (Real Salt Lake)

*I’m going with the spelling used by the USSoccer.com: Peter Nowak. But you can mentally insert “Piotr” if it makes you feel better.