Ahead of the Golden Jaguars’ first appearance at the 2019 Gold Cup next month, the GFF have submitted to CONCACAF a preliminary 40-member squad that would represent Guyana’s historic participation in the tournament.
The Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF) today revealed the preliminary 40-player rosters submitted by the 16 participating Member Associations for this summer’s CONCACAF Gold Cup.
A mix of rising stars, including Christian Pulisic (Chelsea FC/United States), Hirving Lozano (PSV Eindhoven/Mexico) and Alberth Elis (Houston Dynamo/Honduras), together with high-profile veterans such as Keylor Navas (Real Madrid/Costa Rica), Raúl Jimenez (Wolverhampton FC/Mexico) and Michael Bradley (Toronto FC/United States) are among the notable inclusions to the sixteen national teams’ rosters.
The Guyanese 40-member preliminary roster
In accordance with regulations governing the competition, the submitted rosters will serve as the basis for the final 23-player lists for each team. The final 23-player rosters will be announced by CONCACAF in the first week of June.
After the official announcement, only injury-related changes will be allowed, up until 24 hours before each team’s first match; and any injury replacements must come from the preliminary 40-player roster.
Guyana’s roster features 16 locally based players and 24 overseas based players, with the likes of Kelsey Benjamin, Gregory ‘Jackie Chan’ Richardson and Curtez Kellman making the preliminary cut.
The 40-player provisional rosters have been selected and submitted by each participating Member Association, and are published as such. In order to be eligible to play in the CONCACAF Gold Cup, all players are subject to, and must fully comply with, the criteria stipulated in the applicable FIFA and Gold Cup player eligibility regulations.
The 2019 Gold Cup will be the biggest-ever edition of the event, with more participating nations (16, up from 12 in 2017), more host countries (three, including first-time matches in Costa Rica and Jamaica), and more stadiums (17, up from 14 in 2017), eight of which are in contention to become a 2026 FIFA World Cup venue.
The 15th edition of the continental championship will kick off on Saturday, June 15, at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, with Canada and Martinique marking the start of ‘Group A’ action. The second match of the day will feature seven-time Gold Cup champions Mexico versus Cuba.
As part of this expanded format of the tournament, ‘Group B’ will debut in the tournament on Sunday, June 16, in Costa Rica’s Estadio Nacional, marking the first-time the tournament is played in Central America.
Costa Rica and Nicaragua will face-off in ‘Group B’s evening match, while Haiti and Bermuda will open the day’s doubleheader.
In ‘Group C’, the seeded nation Honduras will travel to Kingston, Jamaica to take on the Reggae Boyz, marking the first time the tournament is played in the Caribbean; while Curaçao and El Salvador will battle for early group dominance.
The Michael Johnson-led Golden Jaguars will take on defending champions USA, led by manager Gregg Berhalter, in Minnesota’s Allianz Field in their first game, on June 18. On the same day, more ‘Group C’ action will see Panama taking on Trinidad and Tobago, in what is sure to be a tightly contested match, to round out the day and the first full round of Group Stage matchups.
In the Knockout rounds, Houston’s NRG Stadium and Philadelphia’s Lincoln Financial Field will host two Quarterfinal matches each, on June 29 and 30 respectively. The winning teams will move on to State Farm Stadium in Phoenix and Nissan Stadium in Nashville for the Semifinals. The grand finale is scheduled to be played on July 7th in Chicago’s iconic Soldier Field.
The 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup is sponsored by a number of renowned names, including Allstate Insurance Company, Camarena Tequila, Cerveza Modelo, Nike, Scotiabank, Sprint, Toyota, and Valvoline.
The tournament will be broadcast on the Univision and FOX family of networks, transmitted on radio in Spanish by Fútbol de Primera Radio Network, and broadcast by television partners in over 180 countries around the world.
