Concacaf announces procedures for 2023 Gold Cup draw

Miami, FL – Concacaf has today confirmed important details regarding the 2023 Gold Cup draw, including the event’s hosts, pots, and seeded nations.

The live draw, scheduled to take place on Friday, April 14, 2023, at SoFi Stadium, in Inglewood, California, will start at 12:00 pm PT/local time (3:00 pm ET) and will be hosted by TUDN sportscaster Valeria Marin, Fox Sports Lead Soccer Analyst and US Men’s National Team legend Alexi Lalas and ESPN play-by-play commentator Fernando Palomo. 

Concacaf President and FIFA Vice President, Victor Montagliani, will participate in the event, alongside the teams’ head coaches and important guests. All will be available for interviews at the event’s arrival red carpet and post-draw mixed zone. 

The 17th edition of the Gold Cup is scheduled to take place between June 16 - July 16, 2023. The Final at SoFi Stadium, on Sunday, July 16, will crown Concacaf’s best men’s national team and will conclude two months of elite football in the region that also include the 2023 Scotiabank Concacaf Champions League Final and 2022/23 Concacaf Nations League Finals.

Matches will be available for fans across the region to view on Fox Sports and TUDN | ViX (USA), Televisa | ViX (Mexico), One Soccer (Canada), and ESPN | Star+ in the Caribbean, Central, and South America. For other territories, the event will be available on Concacaf GO, Concacaf's Facebook page, and Concacaf's YouTube channel (all subject to territory restrictions).

2023 CONCACAF GOLD CUP QUALIFICATION

The second edition of the Concacaf Nations League (CNL) served as the qualifier for the 2023 Gold Cup. At the conclusion of Group Stage play on Tuesday night, 12 teams secured a berth in the 2023 Gold Cup Group Stage, joining Asian Champions and guest nation, Qatar. These 12 teams are (listed in alphabetical order per league):

League A group winners: Canada, Mexico, Panama, and United States
League A runners-up: Costa Rica, El Salvador, Honduras, and Jamaica
League B group winners: Cuba, Guatemala, Haiti, and Nicaragua

Furthermore, 12 other teams have qualified for the Gold Cup Prelims. The 12 teams are (listed in alphabetical order per League):

League A third-place finishers: Curaçao, Grenada, Martinique, and Suriname
League B second-place finishers: French Guiana, Guadeloupe, Guyana, and Trinidad and Tobago
League C group winners: Puerto Rico, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Sint Maarten

The 2022/23 CNL final standings can be viewed here.

2023 GOLD CUP PRELIMS DRAW PROCEDURES

The 2023 Gold Cup Prelims draw will be carried out using a single-blind system and one pot.

Based on the Concacaf Men’s National Team Rankings as of March 31, 2023, the teams participating in the Prelims will be seeded into a Round One matchup or placed in Pot 1, as follows (listed in ranking order per pot):

Round One matchups (six highest-ranked teams): Trinidad and Tobago, Martinique, Curaçao, French Guiana, Suriname, and Guyana

Pot 1 (Six lowest ranked teams): Guadeloupe, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Grenada, Puerto Rico, and Sint Maarten.

In accordance with the regulations governing the draw, the six top-ranked teams will be seeded, in ranking order, into a Round One matchup as follows:

The teams in Pot 1 will be drawn one by one and placed in sequential order in matchups 1-6. Once all teams have been assigned a Round One matchup, the Prelims draw will conclude.

The pairings for Round Two have been pre-determined, and will be as follows:

The three Round Two matchup winners will advance to the 2023 Gold Cup Group Stage.

2023 GOLD CUP GROUP STAGE DRAW PROCEDURES

The 2023 Gold Cup Group Stage Draw will be carried out using a double-blind system, involving eight pots.

Pots 1-4 will contain the spheres with the names of the participating teams and Pots 5-8 will contain Group A, B, C, and D spheres.

Based on the Concacaf Men’s National Team Rankings as of March 31, 2023, the 12 Concacaf teams that secured a direct berth into the tournament’s Group Stage will be distributed in Pots 1-3, as follows (listed in ranking order):

Pot 1 (Four highest-ranked teams): Mexico, United States, Costa Rica, and Canada.
Pot 2 (Four next best-ranked teams): Panama, Haiti, Jamaica, and Guatemala.
Pot 3 (Four lowest-ranked teams): Honduras, El Salvador, Cuba, and Nicaragua

The remaining four Group Stage participants, including the three Prelims winners, will be placed in Pot 4, as follows:

Pot 4: Qatar, Winner Prelims 7, Winner Prelims 8, and Winner Prelims 9

Also, in accordance with the regulations governing the draw, the Pot 1 teams will each be seeded into a Group as follows:

Group A: United States (current champions)
Group B: Mexico (highest-ranked team)
Group C: Costa Rica (next highest-ranked seeded team)
Group D: Canada (lowest-ranked seeded team)

The Group Stage draw will commence by placing the Pot 1 seeded teams in their pre-assigned groups, using their pre-assigned group spheres in Pot 5. 

The draw will then continue by drawing spheres from Pot 2 and determining each team’s group with a sphere from Pot 6. The same procedure will be repeated for all spheres, including those in Pots 3 and 4, using the group spheres in Pots 7 and 8, respectively.  

Once all teams have been assigned a group, the draw will conclude.