Concacaf has revealed the details for its new and exciting senior women’s national team competitions taking place from 2021 through 2024. The structure will include two major centralized summer tournaments – the Concacaf W Championship in 2022 and the Concacaf W Gold Cup in 2024.
This new calendar prioritizes providing more official match dates for all Concacaf region women’s senior national teams and ensuring there is elite competition to showcase the highest level of women’s international football in the Confederation.
Through these new competitions, Concacaf will more than double the number of official senior women’s national team matches compared with the previous cycle of women’s national team competitions.
The first phase of this new women’s national team ecosystem begins in November 2021, with the Concacaf W Qualifiers which will include 30 Concacaf nations and serve as qualification matches for the W Championship which takes place in 2022, thus beginning the Road to the FIFA Women’s World Cup 2023 in this region for all competing nations.
The draw for the Concacaf W Qualifiers takes place on Saturday, August 21 at 3:00 pm ET.
“This is a seismic development for our women’s national team competitions and will transform the women’s game in Concacaf,” said Concacaf President and FIFA Vice President, Victor Montagliani. “When we launched our Concacaf W strategy in 2019 we committed to providing more opportunities for all member associations. This new ecosystem wholeheartedly delivers on that and the inclusion of an inaugural Concacaf W Gold Cup as a central part it is a truly exciting step in our journey to further elevate women’s football. I can’t wait to see these matches and new competitions unfold on the pitch and hope they inspire future generations of women and girls to play and develop a passion for the game,” added Montagliani.
“These new competitions will be game-changing for women’s football in Concacaf. I am so excited for the draw this weekend and the first qualification matches for 30 of our women’s national teams in November this year,” said Concacaf Head of Women’s Football Karina LeBlanc. “We are providing a platform for women footballers in Concacaf to thrive, and for women and girls throughout the region to support their national teams with pride,” added LeBlanc.
The structure of the two new competitions and their qualifiers will be as follows:
The new Concacaf W Qualifiers are scheduled to take place during the FIFA Women’s Match Windows of November 2021 and April 2022 and will serve as the preliminary round of the 2022 Concacaf W Championship.
The 30 Concacaf Member Associations participating, all ranked 3 and below in the FIFA Women’s Ranking as of July 2021, will be divided into six groups of five.
After group stage play, where each nation will play two matches at home and two matches away, the top finisher in each of the groups will advance to the Concacaf W Championship, joining the top two ranked Concacaf nations (USA and Canada) who receive a bye straight to the W Championship.
The official draw for the 2021 Concacaf W Qualifiers will take place on Saturday, August 21 at 3:00 pm ET, from Miami, FL. Fans will be able to follow the event live on Concacaf GO via the Confederation’s Official App and Website, Facebook page, and YouTube channel (subject to territory restrictions).
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