The T&T Women Warriors, currently without a coaching staff will have no fewer than two bites of the cherry to qualify for the inaugural Concacaf Women’s Gold Cup to be played between February 17 and March 10, 2024, in the USA.
This was confirmed by Concacaf as it revealed details for the 2023 Road to W Gold Cup, which will serve as the qualifier for the inaugural Concacaf W Gold Cup.
The qualifying tournament is scheduled to take place during the FIFA Women’s International Match Windows of September, October, and November 2023 and will include the participation of 33 Concacaf Member Associations divided into three leagues.
The Concacaf W Gold Cup is the region’s premier competition for women’s senior national teams and is a key part of the “Concacaf W” women’s football strategy the Confederation launched in 2019.
According to Concacaf, following the conclusion of the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand in August, where a record six Concacaf Nations (USA, Canada Costa Rica, Haiti, Jamaica, and Panama) will participate, the road to the first-ever Concacaf W Gold Cup will kick off featuring 33 Concacaf women’s national teams, excluding the two who will compete in the 2024 Paris Summer Olympic Games Women’s Football Tournament (USA and Canada or Jamaica).
The teams will be split into three leagues according to their Concacaf Women’s Ranking as of March 2023, as follows (listed in ranking order):
League A (nine top-ranked teams divided into three groups of three): Canada or Jamaica (Olympic Play-In loser), Costa Rica, Mexico, Panama, Haiti, T&T, Guatemala, Puerto Rico, and Saint Kitts and Nevis
League B (next 12 best-ranked teams divided into three groups of four teams): El Salvador, Guyana, Dominican Republic, Bermuda, Nicaragua, Antigua & Barbuda, Honduras, Suriname, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Martinique, Barbados, and Dominica
League C (lowest 12 ranked teams divided into three groups of four teams): US Virgin Islands, Belize, Curacao, Cayman Islands, Aruba, Grenada, Anguilla, Turks & Caicos Islands, British Virgin Islands, Guadeloupe, Bahamas, and Sint Maarten.
After home and away group stage play, within each League, in the FIFA Women’s International match windows of September, October, and November 2023, the top finishers in each of the League A groups (three teams) will qualify for the 2024 Concacaf W Gold Cup Group Stage.
Furthermore, the second-place finishers in each of the League A groups (three teams) and the first-place finishers in each of the League B groups (three teams) will advance to the 2024 Concacaf W Gold Cup Prelims (six teams in total).
The draw for each of the League A, B, and C will be made on Wednesday, May 1, in Miami, Florida at 7 pm and will be executed using a single-blind system involving three pots for League A, four pots for League B, and four pots for League C.
All Concacaf Member Associations participating in the 2023 Road to Concacaf W Gold Cup Group Stage have been allocated in a League pot based on the Concacaf Women’s Rankings as of March 2023.
The draw for each league will begin by randomly selecting a team from Pot 1 and placing that nation in Group A of their respective league. The draw will continue by selecting the remaining teams from Pot 1 and positioning them into a group in sequential order. The same process will be done for the remaining pots. At the end of each draw, each group will contain one nation from each pot.
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Trinidad and Tobago Women’s Warriors will have to get past World Cup bound Haiti and Panama, if they are to book their spot in the re-branded CONCACAF W Gold Cup, which will be held in 2024, from February 17- March 24 in the United States.
There have been several versions of the CONCACAF Women’s Gold Cup in the past. However, the governing body for soccer in North and Central America and the Caribbean on Wednesday announced the newly re-branded CONCACAF W Gold Cup.
The tournament will be contested by 12 teams. Eight CONCACAF national teams will qualify for the tournament, joined by invited guests Brazil, Colombia, Argentina and Paraguay, the top finishers in South America’s 2022 Copa America Femenina.
The United States, by winning the 2022 CONCACAF W Championship have already qualified, while Women’s Championship runners-up Canada and third-placed Jamaica will battle for another automatic spot. The Six other finalist will be decided via a qualifying process.
T&T’s route to the women’s Gold Cup sees then having to qualify. T&T are grouped in League A, which consists of the nine top-ranked teams, divided into three groups of three.
The Women Warriors are grouped with Panama and Haiti. The winners of that mini group, along with the two other League A winners, get a direct passage to the Gold Cup.
The three League A runners-up get a second chance to qualify via six-team Gold Cup prelims which are scheduled to take place during the FIFA Women’s International match windows of September, October and November 2023.
The six-team qualifying tournament offers the final three spots to the 2024 Gold Cup and will be fought among three League A runners-up and three winners of League B, which consists of the next 12 best-ranked CONCACAF Nations, divided into three groups of four teams. League B contain El Salvador, Guyana, the Dominican Republic, Bermuda, Nicaragua, Antigua and Barbuda, Honduras, Suriname, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Martinique, Barbados, and Dominica.