The Structure of World Soccer
Daniel Wise
Working in the world of government and policy can be like living at ground zero of constant information bombardment with geo-political and socio-economic shells littering the proverbial streets. I love this life, but It’s both a boon and a curse. Like high school, life in DC fills me with a ton of information that makes me wonder, “How is any of this practical or applicable in real life?” For instance, my professional life has led me on a topsy-turvy route to what is called Association Land. This is a magical place run by boards of directors, committees, sub-committees, task forces, and stakeholders. In Association Land, associations have associations and lawyers fight communications managers and coordinators tooth-and-nail over whether or not the double space should be part of an organization’s style guide. It’s a world I have spent the better part of four years getting to know. By this time, I learned that the structure of Association Land is similar to how the governing bodies in professional soccer work. In fact, around the world, this structure of leagues and governing bodies is called association football. These football associations or FAs, are the hyper-local bodies that manage how clubs, stadiums, referees, and personnel operate.
I spent three years with an association called the District of Columbia Association of REALTORS® as their communications associate. While I was employed, I worked on a project that was meant to help newly minted REALTORS® understand the association structure, what our association did to serve their business interests in the legislative arena, and how their donations to the REALTORS® Political Action Committee were allocated and used. The first part of that project focused on the structure of the Association, which had the National Association at the top, which created rules and standards for state and local associations. State Associations tend to manage the overall legislative advocacy for REALTORS® as well as provide regulatory information to help guide them through myriad bureaucratic and ethical minefields. Lastly, the local associations provide licensing and continuing education services for newcomers or those seeking professional designations and development.
The world of association football isn’t too different in terms of how this structure works. At the very top of the pyramid is the Fédération Internationale de Football Association or FIFA for short. That name is often emblazoned on the yearly soccer video game or referenced whenever the World Cup comes around. The organization was started in 1904 to centralize the membership of national associations and organize and promote international competitions. FIFA doesn’t govern the rules of soccer, that’s handled by the International Football Association Board. FIFA oversees 211 national associations, which are divided into six confederations:
Asian Football Confederation (AFC)
Confederation of African Football (CAF)
Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF)
South American Football Association (CONMEBOL)
Oceania Football Confederation (OFC)
Union of European Football Associations (UEFA)
The confederations all govern the federated associations of their respective countries. In our region of North America, we are part of CONCACAF. Our federation is the United States Soccer Federation, which is governed by the North American Football Union that includes the Canadian Soccer Association and the Mexican Football Federation. In the case of the U.S. Soccer Federation, the organization is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit. The organization has a president and CEO, who are Carlos Cordeiro and Dan Flynn respectively. The organization works to promote soccer on the youth level as well as sanction referee and coaching qualifications and domestic tournaments. The most famous of these tournaments is the annual Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup. Within U.S. Soccer, there are domestic leagues that are part of a professional council that include Major League Soccer, National Women’s Soccer League, North American Soccer League, and United Soccer League. U.S. Soccer, like other associations and federations around the world, organize a men’s, women’s, and youth national teams. U.S. Soccer appoints a manager to select players to represent the United States at international tournaments and coach them throughout those tournaments. The current manager for the U.S. Men’s National Team is Gregg Berhalter and the manager for the U.S. Women’s National Team is Jill Ellis. When a manager selects a player to represent the U.S. at these tournaments, that player has been “capped,” which derives from a tradition in the United Kingdom where players were awarded sports caps that signify the occasion. For U.S. Soccer, Christine Lilly has the most caps for the women with 354 and Cobi Jones has the most for the men with 164.
I think it’s particularly important to highlight the general structure of soccer federations and associations at this time because the 2019 summer will feature two major international competitions for the U.S. Men’s and Women’s National Teams. I wanted to create a distinction because the women will compete in the Women’s World Cup in France and the men will compete in the CONCACAF Gold Cup. Both these competitions will run at the same time during the month of June. Both teams are defending their championships in their respective competitions, which means that there’s so much pride at stake for both the men and women.
The FIFA Women’s World Cup starts Friday June 7 with France and Korea Republic kicking off the tournament. The United States have their first game on Tuesday, June 11 against Thailand. The structure of the Women’s World Cup follows that of the Men’s World Cup. There are 24 teams separated into six groups, and the U.S. is in Group F with Thailand, Chile, and Sweden. These teams will each face each other once in the Group Phase of the tournament. Wins garner 3 points, ties are split to 1 point for each team, and losers get 0 points. After each team plays, the points from wins and ties are tallied and the top 16 teams advance to the Knockout Phase, which takes on a traditional single-elimination tournament bracket format.
The CONCACAF Gold Cup starts Friday, June 15 and runs until Sunday, July 7. The tournament is hosted at stadiums across North and Central America and the Caribbean. The Men’s National Team are in Group D with Panama, Trinidad and Tobago, and Guyana. They start their campaign Tuesday, June 18 against Guyana at Allianz Field in Saint Paul, MN. The tournament has a group phase and a knockout tournament phase like the world cup, but the group stage consists of 16 teams in four groups. The top two teams of those groups will then move on to the knockout round of the tournament. As the United States are defending champions from 2017, they will defend their title in this tournament. If they win, then they will have an automatic qualification for a separate tournament called the FIFA Confederations Cup, which is a competition between the winners of their respective confederation competitions. If the United States lose out at any point during the Gold Cup tournament, they will play as the defending 2017 champion against the 2019 champion in a one-match fixture to represent at the 2019 FIFA Confederations Cup.
I understand that this article was a lot to digest, but I hope it helps clarify how competitions are organized on an international level and what it means when acronyms like CONCACAF and UEFA are tossed around on this blog. Moreover, I haven’t even explained how various leagues around the world are organized, but I will save that for a future entry. In the meantime, all you need to know is that this summer (2019) will feature some wonderful soccer from both the United States’ Men’s and Women’s National Teams. I will be writing more about them as their tournaments draw nearer in the coming month. I also hope this lends some understanding to my recent posts about the UEFA Champions League. Did you know that we have our own version of the Champions League in CONCACAF? The 2019 edition just wrapped up on May 1, but next year’s competition will run from February through April 2020. Mexican Liga MX club Monterrey were the champions for 2019, which was their fourth title win. You bet I’ll be writing about that next year. For now, I’ll leave this article where it stands. It’s a lot to digest, so I appreciate you reading this far! Thank you for your support. As always, live well and watch more soccer.