🕵️♂️ Sources: Concacaf to launch new competition for men's national teams
The Concacaf Series would give teams not qualified for the World Cup a chance to play matches in late 2025 and early 2026.
Concacaf is planning to launch the Concacaf Series, a sequence of matches for senior men’s national teams not going to the World Cup, multiple sources confirmed this week to Getting CONCACAFed.
The Concacaf Series would give teams not qualified for the 2026 World Cup a chance to play games in late 2025 and early 2026.
Federations are able to opt in or out of the tournament, meaning the format of the competition isn’t yet set. Other details, including branding, also could shift. The idea, however, is to have each team play two matches in the November FIFA window and two more in March.
That would allow teams that failed to reach the final stage of World Cup qualification or non-FIFA teams to stay in rhythm ahead of the resumption of the Nations League in fall 2026.
The presidents of Concacaf Member Associations were informed about the plan in this month’s 28th Extraordinary Congress, multiple sources indicated. That same meeting, which was conducted virtually, made headlines because of confederation members’ rejection of Greenland’s application for membership.
With the three North American teams automatically qualified for the 2026 World Cup expected to opt-out, and a dozen teams in the final round of World Cup qualification, 26 teams are eligible.
Matches would take place at a centralized site, sources said, potentially with one site per group in the two windows.
Some sources said their understanding was that a draw would take place on June 6, the same day as the Gold Cup final in Houston, once the field is set. Others expected a group announcement rather than a formal draw.
The Concacaf Series name directly echoes the FIFA Series friendly matches the global governing body launched last year in the pilot phase.
Guyana and Bermuda were the Concacaf participants in the first edition, with the Golden Jaguars playing Cape Verde and Cambodia while the Gombey Warriors faced Brunei and Guinea.
The reported attendance figures for those matches in Saudi Arabia show they may not have been a commercial success. Bermuda-Brunei drew 45 while Guyana-Cambodia was a bigger draw, bringing in 46.
That, however, was not the stated goal of the series.
“The FIFA Series are friendly matches that will be contested by national teams from different confederations, who don’t normally have the opportunity to play each other,” read an explainer published on FIFA’s website.
“The ultimate objective of the FIFA Series is to allow more international football interaction, making a concrete contribution to global football development.”
The Concacaf Series would work to achieve the same thing, meaning teams who fell short of qualification wouldn’t have to find other nations in a similar situation - whether within Concacaf or in other confederations - in order to play games in the upcoming windows.
My first reaction on seeing the headline was "oh god, not another one," but reading the story, this actually makes sense. Games for teams not otherwise playing; not mandatory -- seems like a good way to keep them on track toward the 2030 cycle.
Nice