CONCACAF. From now on, continental qualification tournaments will be abbreviated to the last stages: too complicated and meandering from stage to stage. Except Mexico, automatically going to the finals as host, 17 teams entered qualifications. At first preliminary direct eliminations, followed by group stage for the winners of the preliminary eliminations and then final tournament between the group winners and the best team progresses to the world finals. According to FIFA, the whole thing was called Group 11. Three teams withdrew after seeding – Jamaica, Barbados, and Granada – so Canada, Costa Rica, and Trinidad and Tobago had walkovers, going to the next round without playing. Guatemala did not play either – it was blessed with a bye, for the original entrees were uneven number. The Antilles, most likely for financial reasons, decided not to host a match and played both legs in Haiti – one of them they even won, but Haiti already had secured 4-0 victory and small loss did not bother them.
The next stage was between the winners, divided into 3 subgroups. Here money were decisive factor too: Surinam and Trinidad and Tobago played all there games away.
Subgroup A
1.HON^ 4 6 2 2 0 5- 3
2.SAL 4 5 2 1 1 7- 2
3.SUR 4 1 0 1 3 2- 9
Subgroup B
1.CAN^ 4 7 3 1 0 7- 2
2.GUA 4 5 2 1 1 7- 3
3.HAI 4 0 0 0 4 0- 9
Subgroup C
1.COS^ 4 6 2 2 0 6- 2
2.USA 4 5 2 1 1 4- 3
3.TRI 4 1 0 1 3 2- 7
Final round:
1.CAN^ 4 6 2 2 0 4- 2
2.HON 4 3 1 1 2 6- 6
3.COS 4 3 0 3 1 4- 6
Canada achieved its best triumph ever – qualified to the world cup finals. For first time and so far – the last time. It was great campaign, the team never lost a match. This was probably the best Canadian team ever, but let consider the Canadian success carefully: Mexico was entirely out of the picture and all other CONCACAF teams were very weak. Including teams showing improvement – Honduras and may be Costa Rica. Normally, Canada was at that level too, but most of her players were involved with NASL. With the collapse of NASL, it was a matter of planning and money – some Canadian players moved to European clubs. Smaller clubs in smaller leagues, but still European professional clubs, so the experience was valuable. A large group of players had no clubs at all, but the Canadian Federation got financing for more or less permanent training camp for the members of the national team, so, if anything, the players trained together and got used to each other in a way most Central American national teams could not do. To a point, for a weak national team to operate like a club – permanent squad, training together and play only friendlies, could be more beneficial than the usual was, when players are called only for incoming games and after that everybody goes back to its club. To a point, for players of such national team would be even better to concentrate hard on strong performance of the team – this could be the road to a contract with good European professional club. A player, say from Costa Rica, playing semi-professionally at home and occasionally for the national team, such a road could be closed: nobody paid attention to the Costa Rican championship, where the player appeared regularly. The goal of such player used to be NASL, but NASL was no more. Even such arrangements did not elevate the Canadians above the rest, so the final touch was what so many countries did and do – put the opposition in the most unfavourable situation, make life extremely difficult for them on and off the field. Usually Canada hosted international games in the West, mostly in Vancouver – the weather there was fine and there was larger interest in soccer, than east of the Rocky Mountains. In the summer Toronto, Edmonton, Calgary were also used as venues, but if the game was in any other season, it was in Vancouver. And Vancouver was the host town until the final round – at it, Canada used Toronto for the match with Costa Rica (this most certainly done to get as many as possible supporters), but the game with Honduras, the most dangerous rival, was played in St. Johns, Newfoundland. Harsh climate and difficult to reach place – Honduras was put in maximum inconvenience: after slow, difficult and very expensive travel, they had to play on unknown field in tough, windy weather. And even that did not help Canada all that much – Honduras lost only 1-2. But it was victory and just enough for a triumph. As for the heroes, they were anonymous outside North America, although some of them had long successful careers in NASL. Naturally, at least half the squad were not born in Canada – there were Scots, English, Italians, and so on. In 1985, the biggest interest focused on Igor Vrablic, born in Bratislava – he was young, but already played in Europe, so he was seen as the greatest asset of Canada. Not quite right, but in football, the ‘world’ generally meant Europe, so Vrablic was hailed.