Neil R.

Since it's the last day of September, I hope we get a CONCACAF ranking update today. Our September window was fantastic (win against the US, draw against Mexico) and I'd really like to know before League A plays their last 2 Nations League matches in about a week or so, who is currently 2nd, 3rd, and how close they are in ranking points. If we get an updated set of rankings today and we have a really good shot at 2nd, it will be fun to follow the last 2 League A matchdays knowing we would get the 2nd place finisher from Group A or B with the highest point total as our Nations League quarter-final opponent.

Ticket sales are rolling along for the Panama friendly next month. The first 9 rows of 219-227 have been put on sale since the last time I checked. I thought there would be more left in 106-109 than there is with 3 weeks to go, and there are quite a few 100-level sections that only have a small number of seats remaining. Nice!

It's nice to see us gain another 7.65 points, putting us back over 1500 in the FIFA rankings. I know people will say "it doesn't matter, they won't be relevant again for us until year whatever", but I think that's very short-term thinking. At some point in the future, they will matter again, and we'll be glad we were adding to our total during the non-relevant times.

I don't know if we've passed the US or not with the September window, but my first thought was, if we haven't, and you wanted as few windows as possible to be used in the calculation for quarter-final seeding, you'd start updating the rankings so that the previous month's matches weren't included until the middle of the following month. Providing the August update in mid-September could be the start of something where the October matches aren't included in a ranking update until mid-November, which means they're not part of the October 2024 rankings that determine the quarter-final seeding. Hopefully the more charitable explanation is what's really happened. With nothing happening in August, they forgot to do it and just realized it now.

If we end up overtaking the US for 2nd in the CONCACAF rankings after the October update, I wouldn't mind Guatemala, Suriname, or Nicaragua as a quarter-final opponent. Just not Guadeloupe. Please. I'll lose my mind if we have 2 matches with Guadeloupe (at a decent FIFA points multiplier, tournament quarter-final) and come away empty-handed. We've had 4 Gold Cups in a row with a non-FIFA member (Guadeloupe 2023, Martinique 2021, Martinique 2019, French Guiana 2017) and we also had to play French Guiana in the qualifying phase of the Nations League the inaugural year. Guadeloupe is currently 1 point out of 2nd, and their final 2 matches are against Martinique, so hopefully they don't end up as the 2nd place team with the highest point total.

The gap was already shrinking after the first match of this window, and it just got even closer tonight! The US drawing a much lower-ranked opponent (New Zealand) is also going to cost them some points, while both of our matches this window have been net gains (defeating the US and drawing a higher-ranked opponent, Mexico). I didn't think it was possible to catch them before November either, but there might actually be a chance. If we did and ended up being the 2nd seed in the quarter-finals, I think of the 2 League A 2nd place finishers, we would play the one with the higher point total. Hopefully we get a CONCACAF ranking update at the end of this month.

This is the most recent version of the CONCACAF rankings (post-COPA). It looks like the CONCACAF rankings at the end of October will determine how the top 4 are seeded for the Nations League quarter-finals. With our win yesterday over the US, we'll have more than a 13-point cushion now over Panama, and we'll have closed the gap a bit with the US. I didn't realize the US was only 36 points ahead of us in the CONCACAF rankings. I don't know how many CONCACAF points you get for defeating the US in a friendly, but even if it's 6 like in the FIFA rankings, that's like closing a 12-point gap since the team you're chasing loses the same number of points you gain. By the end of the October window, the race for 2nd could actually be pretty close. It's closer than I thought it was.

Fantastic result. What a dominant first half. We closed this match out really well. So many times in the final 5-10 minutes, I was saying to myself: "This is exactly what we should have done in second half stoppage time in the Uruguay match." Nice to see those lessons learned and implemented at the first available opportunity. I like what this victory does for us psychologically. The guys have proven to each other they can defeat the US on their home soil. This was the perfect time to clear that hurdle with Nations League and the Gold Cup coming up.

Thanks! I thought it had already been decided, but I'm mistaken. The Wikipedia chart has us lined up with best ranked group winner, but I guess it's only because we're the first of the 4 quarter-finalists alphabetically and it's just a placeholder until the October rankings. New take: In case we get the lower ranked group winner and that team comes from Group B, I'm still glad Jamaica dropped some points to Cuba. 😂 Jamaica's 3 remaining matches are in Honduras, in Nicaragua, and home to Honduras. They could still win the group of course, but a lower ranked team with a slightly easier schedule could find themselves in a pretty nice position by the time these 4 matches are done.

If Cuba can hang on for another 5 minutes (down to 10 men since late in the first half) and hold Jamaica to a 0-0 draw, that could be very helpful for us I think. Since we play the group winner with the highest number of points in the quarter-final, I wouldn't mind Jamaica not getting the maximum number of points from their first match at all.

A little bit of history made this afternoon for CONCACAF's lowest-ranked nation. Anguilla defeated Turks and Caicos Islands 2-0, giving them their first-ever Nations League victory. It's too bad Leagues B and C don't end up crowning a champion.

Interesting to see Leagues B and C doing centralized venues within each group. Seems smart. Bring all 4 teams to the same country and play all the matches for that window in the same location. Someone has updated Wikipedia with the centralized locations for the October and November windows (a different country within each group). That works out nicely. 3 out of 4 countries in each group in League B and 2 out of 3 in each group in League C will get to have 2 home matches sometime in September, October, or November. League B centralized locations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024–25_CONCACAF_Nations_League_B League C centralized locations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2024–25_CONCACAF_Nations_League_C

Didn't receive an e-mail with a code today from Canada Soccer despite being CanadaRED+GOLD since April 2022. Sent them an e-mail and reached out on Twitter, so hopefully they can get it sorted out and make sure my membership details are accurate in their database. I'm guessing there will still be plenty of tickets left when the public on-sale starts so I'm not too worried about that, but it would have been nice to buy through the fan membership program in case that has any sort of bearing on ticket chances for 2026.

It's too bad we couldn't have hung on against Honduras. I think that would have put us in a position where we could have won the group with a draw tonight.

The FIFA website says the next rankings update is tomorrow. Nice to see we're moving up and getting closer to 1500. Imagine if we'd had the full points from 2 regulation wins in the Venezuela match and the Uruguay match.