Copa América Centenario 2016

[Jordan]

While I hear there's a big tournament to be played next month, it's worth noting that what was already going to be a great summer of 2016 in international football has just gotten better with a special edition of Copa América to be played that June, celebrating the 100th anniversary of that tournament. CONMEBOL and CONCACAF have just announced this at a press conference in Miami.

The tournament will be held in the USA and feature the 10 CONMEBOL teams plus the USA, Mexico, the Carribean champion, the Central American champion, and two teams to qualify via the 2015 CONCACAF Gold Cup.

If the participating countries bring their top squads, this will be awesome. I'm glad the USA gets a crack at playing the South Americans, that the USA gets to host another major tournament, and that June/July of 2016 will be just non-stop football.

[Guest MattP]

Love it, the Copa America is my favourite International tournament after the World Cup.

 

More than likely I'll use my summer holiday in 2016 to follow this, want to do a bit more travelling in the US and always wanted to see a Copa so this looks the perfect chance to do both.

[Pride_Of_The_Midlands]

Celebrate the 100th anniversary of South America's championship by holding it in North America.

 

Sounds legit.

 

Luis Suarez should really be racking up the caps 

 

2010 - World Cup

2011 - Copa America

2012 - Olympics

2013 - Confederations Cup

2014 - World Cup

2015 - Copa America

2016 - Copa America Centenario

[MC Prussian]

Celebrate the 100th anniversary of South America's championship by holding it in North America.

 

Sounds legit.

The Copa América tournament is about 40+ years older than the UEFA European Championship.

 

You never know... With the way both big football associations are behaving and where they seem to be heading tactically, in some thirty years time, we might see a European Championship being held outside of Europe, too.

[Pride_Of_The_Midlands]

Love it, the Copa America is my favourite International tournament after the World Cup.

 

More than likely I'll use my summer holiday in 2016 to follow this, want to do a bit more travelling in the US and always wanted to see a Copa so this looks the perfect chance to do both.

 

:w00t:

 

Ahead of the European Championship?

 

I'd have both the Euros and the Africa Cup of Nations before the Copa America.

[Guest MattP]

:w00t:

 

Ahead of the European Championship?

 

I'd have both the Euros and the Africa Cup of Nations before the Copa America.

 

Easily.

 

Love the Latin way of playing football, I watch the Copa Libertadores for the same reason, focus on skill and ability more than any other facet of the game as well. Add to that it just ends with mental scenes half the time.

 

I like the Euros as well, I'd rather watch paint dry than the African Nations, reminds me of youth team football over here, all emphasis on big blokes with power and pace. Big reason African football still hasn't managed to move on since the 90's.

[Dan]

The cup of nations that is a desperate attempt at knocking South America.

[Guest MattP]

The cup of nations that is a desperate attempt at knocking South America.

 

Even for Pride_of_the_Midlands that was taking it too far.

 

Thinking about it, African Nations above all, ridiculous opinions regarding Latin football, enforcing a daft opinion on everyone else despite no one listening, bigging up players through name rather than performance aka Wilshere...

 

Is POTM Garth Crooks?

[Dan]

Probably because Nigeria have had more players in the Premier League than Venezuela so they're automatically better.

 

Sorry but some of POTM's flaws to what he comes out with are matched by no-one on here. How utterly ridiculous.

[Pride_Of_The_Midlands]

Easily.

 

Love the Latin way of playing football, I watch the Copa Libertadores for the same reason, focus on skill and ability more than any other facet of the game as well. Add to that it just ends with mental scenes half the time.

 

I like the Euros as well, I'd rather watch paint dry than the African Nations, reminds me of youth team football over here, all emphasis on big blokes with power and pace. Big reason African football still hasn't managed to move on since the 90's.

 

Italy, Spain and Portugal are Latin aren't they?

[MC Prussian]

Italy, Spain and Portugal are Latin aren't they?

You forgot France. Shame on you.

[Guest MattP]

Italy, Spain and Portugal are Latin aren't they?

 

Well yeah, what's your point?

 

Hence "I like the Euros as well"

[Pride_Of_The_Midlands]

Probably because Nigeria have had more players in the Premier League than Venezuela so they're automatically better.

 

Sorry but some of POTM's flaws to what he comes out with are matched by no-one on here. How utterly ridiculous.

 

Nigeria are better than Venezuela though...

 

Copa America has too few teams, so much so that they have to invite random teams like China ( ) just to get 12 teams.

 

Also, the South Americans teams play each other home and away through-out World Cup qualification so really you could say that whoever finishes first in WCQ are the South American champions.

 

Africa has more teams and more teams who could win it - Zambia won it in 2012 and Burkina Faso were runners-up in 2013. You get different teams who qualify each time (e.g. Cape Verde, Ethiopia) rather than the same teams every time like in the Copa America.

 

I would say the AFCON gets more coverage in England than the Copa America.

[Dan]

Nigeria being better than Venezuela has nothing to do with my argument and I wouldn't bank on it either. Nigeria have qualified for the World Cup but they weren't up against the likes of Argentina & Colombia in qualifying.

 

Belittling it because of a lack of teams? Really? So what you'd want is another 20 teams consisting of... lets be honest, complete shite.

 

The beauty of the Copa America is that there are very few shit sides.

[Guest MattP]

Africa has more teams and more teams who could win it - Zambia won it in 2012 and Burkina Faso were runners-up in 2013. You get different teams who qualify each time (e.g. Cape Verde, Ethiopia) rather than the same teams every time like in the Copa America.

 

I would say the AFCON gets more coverage in England than the Copa America.

 

I'm sure they would both do well in the Copa

 

Of course the AFCON gets more coverage than the Copa over here, we have loads of Africans living here, the BBC pick up the ball and run with it, Garth Crooks gets a chance to show to the World how black he is and we all know about it as it happens right in the middle of the football season so our teams lose our players to it.

 

Whilst the Copa is a summer late night kick off tournament on Sky Sports.

 

How many do you think would stay up to watch Zambia v Burkina Faso at 1am in June?

 

Nigeria being better than Venezuela has nothing to do with my argument and I wouldn't bank on it either. Nigeria have qualified for the World Cup but they weren't up against the likes of Argentina & Colombia in qualifying.

 

Belittling it because of a lack of teams? Really? So what you'd want is another 20 teams consisting of... lets be honest, complete shite.

 

The beauty of the Copa America is that there are very few shit sides.

 

Spot on, you never watch a game in the Copa where you think a side is really shit, Bolivia are bad at the minute but they would still beat more African sides than not.

[Guest MattP]

Do you think this will be the future eventually Jordan?

 

Wouldn't surprise me to see the Americas amalgamate the tournaments in time and do away with the Gold Cup.

[The Doctor]

Easily.

 

Love the Latin way of playing football, I watch the Copa Libertadores for the same reason, focus on skill and ability more than any other facet of the game as well. Add to that it just ends with mental scenes half the time.

 

I like the Euros as well, I'd rather watch paint dry than the African Nations, reminds me of youth team football over here, all emphasis on big blokes with power and pace. Big reason African football still hasn't managed to move on since the 90's.

 

Really? Love the ACON - s'all about laughing at how shit the keepers are.

[Pride_Of_The_Midlands]

The more teams the merrier.

 

That's why I'm looking forward to Euro 2016.

 

When you have China and Japan in the South American championship though that is just ridiculous. They should just invite Suriname and Guyana.

 

I'm sure quality of play is higher in the Copa America but I prefer the AFCON as a tournament.

Do you think this will be the future eventually Jordan?

 

Wouldn't surprise me to see the Americas amalgamate the tournaments in time and do away with the Gold Cup.

 

Gold Cup or Asian Cup?

[Guest MattP]

Really? Love the ACON - s'all about laughing at how shit the keepers are.

 

I was in a mess watching it a few years back when a sub stripped off and ran on the pitch after a red card. What he was doing to this day I'll never know.

 

This was a classic as well.

 

[Guest MattP]

The more teams the merrier.

 

That's why I'm looking forward to Euro 2016.

 

When you have China and Japan in the South American championship though that is just ridiculous. They should just invite Suriname and Guyana.

 

I'm sure quality of play is higher in the Copa America but I prefer the AFCON as a tournament.

 

Gold Cup or Asian Cup?

 

Speak for yourself, I think it will be a disaster and Euro 2016 will really suffer in terms of quality.

 

Gold Cup, look at the entries for 2016, not an Asian in there, they have invited teams in the past to make it up to 12. Not my thing personally but wasn't the worst thing they could do.

[The Doctor]

I was in a mess watching it a few years back when a sub stripped off and ran on the pitch after a red card. What he was doing to this day I'll never know.

 

This was a classic as well.

 

 

African countries aren't known for their knowledge of how football works though...

 

[Guest MattP]

I love the way they just ignore it as well, this guy ran on, played for 30 seconds then ran on, no complaints, no inquiry, just carried on as if nothing happened.

[CosbehFox]

African countries aren't known for their knowledge of how football works though...

There's actually a very sinister story about this; the leader of Zaire said lose by more than five and your families will be executed. Basically the Zaire players tried every delaying tactic including this.

As for the tournament great news, 16 is the ideal number for continental tournaments featuring the two most successful continents.

[Jordan]

Even if Brazil only sends mostly u23s to Copa America tournaments, their squads are still always good. CA is always a decent competition.

Do you think this will be the future eventually Jordan?

Wouldn't surprise me to see the Americas amalgamate the tournaments in time and do away with the Gold Cup.

I think the GC and CA will remain intact. However, in addition to the CA Centenario being a money grab, it looks like this is also a test run of sorts for similar events running in the future.

CONCACAF needs the Gold Cup because it needs to get more of its member associations a piece of the pie. The Gold Cup isn't exactly a marquee event but because it is held in the USA, where every team can be a home team, it still draws decent crowds. I think last year's tournament averaged about 35k per game (worth noting that many games are doubleheaders), and that was lower than it should have been because Mexico were crap.

CONMEBOL needs Copa America because they rotate the tournament around all their member nations, and nobody wants to miss out a chance to host. CONMEBOL has said that they went to the USA for this special tournament (which Mexico actually suggested they do) because the money, the stadiums, and the fans are all there, and make no mistake--any future expanded CAs will be held in the US, too.

Gold Cups every two years is absolute overkill. If 2016 runs well, I can similar tournaments being played in the USA either every four or eight years with the CA and GC staying intact, or the GC switching to a four-year cycle. USA may throw CONMEBOL a bone in return sometime in the near future and accept an invitation to an upcoming Copa America and Klinsi (if he's still around) will send a B-team.

There will be more cooperation between the two confederations in the future because the UEFA Nations League leaves less opportunities to play the Europeans in friendlies.

This tournament isn't yet on the FIFA Calendar, though, so CONMEBOL/CONCACAF may want to get on that soon. They haven't even selected venues or made a schedule, but I think they can whip that up quickly enough.