After the October international window concluded, the Concacaf region now looks ahead to the upcoming Concacaf W Championship in November. The tournament serves as a qualifier for the 2027 FIFA Women's World Cup and for spots at the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. One quarterfinal game has already sparked a head-coaching controversy a month before the official kickoff.
The Concacaf W Championship is now an eight-team, direct knockout format. The United States and Canada earned direct byes into the tournament, while six other teams from the region competed for the remaining spots. The teams were then matched by official ranking, with the highest-ranked team facing the lowest, and the USWNT drew El Salvador in the upcoming quarterfinal.
Canada will face Panama, Mexico will play Haiti, and Jamaica and Costa Rica will round out the quarterfinal round. As the U.S. women's national team look ahead to the November competition after mixed results against Spain, where they lost 2-0 and drew 2-2, they'll face a national team dealing with a complex head-coaching controversy. El Salvador and the USWNT will meet in the quarterfinals, just a month after head coach Eric Acuna made disparaging comments about his own players on La Selecta following a two-game series against Paraguay.
El Salvador faced Paraguay in a pair of friendlies and lost both. La Selecta opened the series with a discouraging 5-1 defeat, prompting a controversial set of comments from coach Acuna, then closed out the window with a 3-2 loss. The finale on Monday was an eventful match, with El Salvador up two goals in the first half by Brenda Cere n and Danya Gutierrez, but things spiraled after halftime.
The group conceded a goal early in the second half, then Nicolle Amaya received a second yellow and was sent off, giving Paraguay a player advantage. Paraguay capitalized and scored an equalizer, then Gutierrez received a second yellow -- prompting another player exit for El Salvador. With a two-player advantage, the game-winning goal for Paraguay came in the 80th minute, when Monserrat Ayala scored, and La Selecta couldn't rally for a result.
The second loss led to Acuna doubling down on his comments from the previous match. After the first loss in the October window, coach Acuna told the press that the effort was poor and that the team didn't have a clear enough focus on the games ahead. He also expressed that his immediate adjustment was going to be one of retaliation towards his players and revoke off-camp privileges immediately leading up to game two.
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