We Need To Talk About The 2024 Copa América 

You enter to watch a copa America video and then you find yourself getting educated about the Ecuadorian economy, thanks Alfie

I think Conmebol and CONCACAF should agree to scrap the gold cup and make it a true copa America. North and South America

In South America, the word "America" usually refers to the entire Americas, so Copa America is a suitable name for a competition that includes the USA and Mexico as well as the CONMEBOL members

Rooting hard for Colombia to win the “Copper America”

it seems like more people outside the americas have a problem with this tournament than people actually living here

As an American can confirm there's nothing worse than the US ticket market. Hopefully the US Justice Dept. wins their case against Ticketmaster/Live Nation and the situation can improve

The 16 team format guarantees: 1. Every CONMEBOL nation plays at least 1 CONCACAF nation 2. No 3rd place teams advance

“Like the African cup of nations hosted by Austria” I don’t think it’s the same scenario as it’s literally called “copa America” which makes sense because it’s all American countries

I'm really happy with new copa format. Finally 4 groups of 4

⁠Copa America literally translates to cup of America/America Cup. Both continents of North and South America are literally referred to together as the Americas. There is nothing weird nor wrong about this

As a brazilian, I have absolutely loved this new format

Copa America is basically what it should be. It's part of the American continent, not for South America alone.

To be fair, Mexico and the US are still in America. Qatar on the other hand...

It’s Copa America, not Copa Sudamerica. It is nothing like having African or Asian teams in the Euros. Most people understand that there’s probably gonna be a merger or in the future, a proper Copa between both confederations. Also what you said about the Copa America being held every 4 years is simply untrue. It was held every for years only twice from 2007 to 2011 to 2015. Before that it was sporadically and usually every 2 or 3 years. Also no one who travels to the Copa America games even thinks about any political situations going on in the host nation unless the situation is absolutely dire. If it’s not a situation like Haiti then it’s perfectly fine to host it.

Something else to consider is how badly CONCACAF teams need this tournament from a competitive perspective. The USMNT has won every tournament in CONCACAF since 2021 where we had our top talent (Nations League and Gold Cup were splitting the rosters). As recent friendlies proved, all the CONCACAF teams are way behind South American ones.

As someone who live in the CONCACAF region I live this format much better. All the bigger countries treat the Gold Cup very passively as best, last Gold Cup all the bigger teams pretty much had the B squads playing. The European Championships best format was when it was 16 teams. Having all 10 South America and 6 CONCACAF members qualify is pretty fair split and still be pretty competitive.

I think if anything, having so many North American nations in the Copa America makes it more of a Copa America. Like it’s not the Copa America del Sur, so theoretically it’s not an issue if any team from the Americas plays in it

Why does having CONCACAF teams make it no longer Copa America? America isn’t just South America

As much as it IS a cash grab let's be honest NO country in south America except Brazil and Argentina (who have recently held the Copa America) could organize the tournament in the short time since Ecuador said they couldn't do it. Even then Argentina have a host of economic problems. As a South American I do think it sucks that a lot of recent tournaments have gone to the US but I genuinely think 16 team format with constant teams from all of america. Also adding Mexico and Canada to the pool of places it could be held isn't terrible. We do give a bit of proportional power to concacaf but I think this format makes the overall cake bigger

I don't know what you're bitching about. Conmebol decided to make a cup together with CONCACAF, which makes sense. There aren't too many teams in South America. Expanded format includes a lot more teams, hence a lot more viewership, and a lot more money.

Football politics and maintenance of power will prevent Conmebol and Concacaf from merging. No executive's giving up their power for the sake of a healthier charge.

It would be great if they made it official that Copa America is tournament for the whole of America and it's a 16 team tournament. CONMEBOL could still keep the advantage by having all 10 members quality automatically while out of 41 CONCACAF memvers only 6 qualify. CONCACAF can decide how they select those 6 teams, would it be a separate qualifications campaign or would they use either world cup qualifiers or CONCACAF gold cup as the qualifiers for Copa America. I'm not from South America myself and I don't know what locals think about it, but I know that when I watched Copa America and see Mexico or USA or any other North American countries, it didn't feel weird, but it was so weird seeing Japan and Qatar participating in Copa America.

Com' on, why do you have to represent Nigeria with an image of a village while depicting Europe with a cityscape? This kind of bias is disappointing and reminiscent of mainstream media. Nigeria has vibrant cities and diverse landscapes that deserve accurate representation.

In reality the hosting of Copa América has been a messy issue for decades thanks to CONMEBOL's own idiocy, it was always meant to be every 4 years but then CONMEBOL had it every 2 years in the 90s until 2001, then had it once in 2004 but they saw it having the same year as the Euros an issue so they decided it was going to be every 4 years the year between the year after the World Cup and before the Euro(which was how it was originally meant to be in the 70s and 80s) and that was the case with the exception of the 2016 edition(Again, why was that even a thing?), but suddenly in 2019 they decided it had to be the same year as the Euros so they were going to have another in 2020 so the following year after one was already played! That one ended up being played in 2021 because of COVID. In the end the next Copa América is meant to be played in 2028, don't be surprised if that date is changed around again. And the least we talk about CONMEBOL club competitions the better. All 10 south american football associations have their own fair share of issues particular to them but out of the six confederations CONMEBOL is likely the worst run one out there. The success of south american football is all in spite to CONMEBOL. Also the use of the name "Copa América" came long before there were any guests, it was first used in 1975, the first Copa América that had teams from outside CONMEBOL playing was in 1993.

not sure if I'm ready to hear Alfie say "Copper America" over and over for almost 30 minutes (it's so funny how Brits often don't realize how they invent "r"s between vowels out of thin air!)

You also have to consider that there are, what, 7-10+ million people of direct South American origin in the USA, which is 3 times as many people as Uruguay's population, for example. It's still essentially serving as a home atmosphere for a large number of South Americans.

There is no R in Copa.

Its the Copa AMERICA. NEWSFLASH: North AMERICA is in the Americas. It isn't called the Copa SURAmerica, it's the Copa America.

Why not show a picture of a city in Nigeria rather than just a dry farmland but show a nice picture of Austria when mentioning it. The narrative people in the west have about Africa is appalling

Lmao. You actually brought up the “high crime rate” and “mass shootings” like Brazil, Columbia, and other countries are just as bad. What a joke.

CONMEBOL and CONCACAF need to combine, it will improve quality across both continents and make World Cup qualification a lot more exciting

Copa America could be huge if they combined both confederations like this much more often. You get more teams, the big south american giants, and the big money from North America.

But it's called "Copa America" not "Copa Sudamerica", I don't see the issue 🤷

You can smell the Eurosnobbery exuding from this video

Bro United States is in America. The only thing weird here Is a man from England complaining about USA being part of copa America. I like your videos but this one is not it at all

I think the main difference to us is that in Spanish, the word América means "the Americas" as a whole, (This is also where that whole "you can't call yourselves Americans" feud with Americans comes from) it's actually the "the Americas Cup" so it doesn't really feel weird at all that it's done in the US, it feels weird that Concacaf is not included, in fact, we've tried to invite all of the Concacaf to join officially, but they've always refused, stating that the level of the teams involved clearly favors South America.

Nah. A decent amount of people have been thinking CONMEBOL and CONCACAF should just merge. To make a bigger and more competitive confederation.

As a Paraguayan American I am okay with the United States being the permament host for every single future edition of Copa America 👌🏼

Huge disclaimer from an actual latino- we don’t care about north and south america. it’s just America🤷‍♂️

To compare the US to the crime and political instability of South America is wild lol. It's not even the same strateosphere.

I don't understand how ppl can be mad that the Copa America now includes North America, it just makes the tournament more exciting, inclusive, competitive, lucrative, and entertaining

In Spanish there is no "North and South America" as separate continents. There is just one, America. For us the countries of "South America" are our brothers. Nothing weird playing this tournament together. If anything it bonds us stronger as a unified Latin American identity.

Great video! Adding to the economic crisis in Ecuador there is a cartel war going on with the state which boiled over at the start of the year when cartel members stormed a tv station in a live broadcast and held them hostage and two of the most powerful drug kingpins in the country fled captivity. Since then the president Daniel Noboa has declared an internal armed conflict against the cartels. I highly doubt the Copa América would have gone ahead in Ecuador under these circumstances.

Love your videos, but comparing the copa america in the us and the euros in Nigeria is an awful take.

As a mexican is very normal to move the copa america to EEUU, there is a lot of latin americans living there, and all of them love football, also this is a preparation for the next world cup, so yeah, is normal.

2:45 Its really nothing like Afcon being hosted in Austria lmao. The Latin American diaspora in the USA is insanely huge. The US can host big tournaments and a reminder that the record game attendance for a World Cup is the US in 1994, extra impressive because they had 12 less games than all the world cups since. More bums on seats than Germany, France, Japan, even Brazil could manage with 12 extra games. they have the facilities and population to host big events like this. Plus Its good for the best of concacaf to perform on a big stage other than the World Cup. (I havent finished the video yet so maybe he agrees with me)

Just scrap the Golden Cup for a “combined Copa America”

Well, contrary to the Euro, Afcon or the Asian Cup, the Copa America was stuck with the same 10 teams without any chance for an expansion. We're living in an era of more, more, more so them wishing for a bigger tournament doesn't come as much of a surprise. Also, Ecuador was on the brink of a civil war early this year.

Listen bro... I love u and your content, but this right here is a bad perespective on the look of the copa america. In ancient times as is (or what feels ancient at this point) people used to see north, central (yeah cuz people just lump it in with north america), and south america as its own single continent (america). It was worldwide knowledge it was africa, america, asia, australia(yes australia was its own thing as well), and europe. This tournament brings the tournament back to its roots of how america as a whole should be viewed and is an effort to heavily advance football (or soccer if you are from the americas speaking english). Concacaf needs their countries to face higher competition to then perform better in the world cup, which in turn would have millions more in what u see as north america, tune in and/or fall in love with the sport. Conmebol has had a dying tournament for some time now because south america lacks more countries (obviously because south america wasn't supposed to be split into its own thing in the first place). The euros with their highly modern fields and vast countries to see go at it obv had copa beat. There is also the snobby "sophiticated" aesthetic that revolves around european soccer, that simply isn't carried around copa. For the most part in history, south america simply dazzled u with its "street soccer" as best emphasized by edu vargas sending iker casillas flying in the 2014 world cup, and as far as usa and canada stood, they didn't even care about it. You're not getting entertaining antics like luis suarez biting somebody, marcelo bielsa's squads 1v1 marking like it's basketball, or the tricks/skill moves of creative play in the euros. Set pieces, spaced out robotic formations, track athletes doing cardio with little to no technical ability is common, and crosses often gets boring.

Nigeria hosting the Euro made me laugh out loud 😂 thanks for mentioning us though 🇳🇬🇳🇬

In Latin America, we consider north and south america the same continent. It's not the same as Africa hosting the EUROs. Africa is far more distinct to europe. While, culturally, the status of north america and south america not being one continent actually varies. More importantly, mexicans and americans are still in the Americas, so it's not that big of a deal to me.

I'm Chilean and to be honest the Copa America has always been a whatever detailswise. The history of the tournament is full of random bullshit, which makes you naturalizing any unusual thing. You said you would feel weird if 40% of the euros team aren't from Europe, but I wouldnt feel weird if the Copa America has several non Conmebol countries and even lacks a few Conmebol teams just because this happens from time to time It's not news if a dog bites a man but it's news if a man bites a dog sort of deal.

as a peruvian this video was so hard to watch holy shit. why isn’t there a single european channel who knows jack shit about conmebol, not even the littlest of knowledge😒

It’s called Copa America, not Copa South America. That’s like the Euros being held in Germany. Yeah, they are a part of Europe…

América, my friend, is a continent from Canadá to Argentina. La Copa America, yes it was played only in South America but, it would be more interesting if all the countries of our continent AMERICA (no Americas) have the opportunity to play the oldest and most important competition of the continent.

What I don't agree with you is that for us américa is a whole thing. South and north. And in football it should be that way. Our copa américa should always have concacaf. It makes it bigger and more interesting.And teams like México need it more than ever to up their game.

Sadly, Freddy Adu never got to played at Copa America.

It is called Copa America not Copa South America

The cultural and educational facts that many people ignore is that in the Anglo-Saxon world’s view, there are three Americas, North America, Central America (including the Caribbean) and South America; whereas in the Spanish speaking world also known as Latin America, there’s only one continent called AMERICA and it’s view as one whole region. So, having Canada, the United States and Mexico as well as Central American nations competing in the COPA AMERICA tournament makes a lot of sense. 👍

Concacaf meaning Canada, Mexico and USA, the six Central American countries and the rest of Conmebol should just make one conferation

It would make so much sense for the Copa America and Concacaf Gold Cup to merge and create one Pan-American championship.

It's Copa America and not Copa South America... All the teams in the Americas should participate... This should be the standard format...

Every country in the Americas that has made it to the Copa previously on merit, or is ranked by FIFA at least in the top 25, should be eligible, to host assuming they have the infrastructure and are safe enough to properly host. The US hosting Copa America is entirely appropriate. The only argument against it is that other countries should have been given further consideration, since the US has hosted 2 of the last 3. It's not inappropriate like Qatar hosting the World Cup.

About the name still being "Copa América" there is an important cultural factor that most people don't know about. "Continents" don't have a precise definition. While for English speakers South America and North America are two continents with similar names, for most Spanish and Portuguese speakers, America (yes, just America) is one continent split in three (North, Central and South). So, while 10/16 teams are from South America, all 16 teams are from America (except for people in the US who think there's only one team from America, and the others are from "the Americas"). Also, I've always thought that CONMEBOL and CONCACAF should be just one confederation. I find it very weird that CONMEBOL has only 10 teams and always the same matches over and over (Guyana, Surinam and French Guyana play in CONCACAF), and CONCACAF certainly needs more competition.

just saying, north america and south america should be playing one continental competition

Almost nobody in the Americas has a problem with this new format...it seems to be Europeans that don't like it lmao

Believe me, American citizens have a problem with the price gouging in every aspect of our entertainment industry. It's our politicians who are bought out by these corporations and don't give a crap. Although let's hope this antitrust suit against Ticketmaster can change some things.

In the US there are more than enough latin american fans that live and work there. Also, we have seen how Argentinians, Brazilians and Uruguayans for example spare no expenses travelling to countries like Qatar or Russia. CONMEBOL may not like it, but for me the best format is this one, with six CONCACAF teams. That is much better than inviting Japan and Qatar

Probably one of your worst videos to be honest. Copa America has long had guests in their tournament and they got embarrassing when CONCACAF teams stopped going (Qatar?). At least the US is in North America. It’s Copa America, not Copa Sur America lol. Plus it may be a good break for the CONMEBOL sides who play each other so much. And of course you forgot it’s not some random country, it gives the South Americans a chance to familiarize themselves with the main host of the next World Cup

Thanks Alfie, learned a lot about the Copper America today!

You ain't lying about the ticket prices. I have season tickets for Charlotte FC and was thinking about buying tickets for one of the Charlotte games (semi-final, 3rd place). I love my seats for Charlotte FC and was going to purchase the same for Copa America. The price difference was 400%. I'll be watching the games on TV.

I paid $260 for a semi final ticket in Charlotte. Level 5, row 1. How much is a ticket to the Euro semi final?

you need to talk about the welsh premier league. despite the recent success of the welsh national team, the league is seriously ignored, and only has 1 proffesional team (that happens to be in england ffs)

They should stop inviting teams from Asia and Europe. They should stick to the format of keeping the 10 nations of South America and the rest from the North and Central America depending on their performance from concacaf gild cup and concacaf nations league

To be fair - I'd be all for Conmebol and Concacaf just flat out merging. I think it'd be excellent

As an American footballer (soccer player) in my 50’s who has been playing and Loving this game since I was a child. Growing up, I was usually one of the only players born here. For me, for most of my life this country has been starved of serious football. I’ve seen the Love for the Beautiful Game in the US expand tremendously! As fair as your points are, I do think the US is able to provide for the fans as well as their safety. If FIFA weren’t so corrupt, I would expect that they could find balanced ways of supporting countries who haven’t hosted to help them. Unfortunately, I don’t see that happening any time soon.

If the Copa America had always included all the Americas, not just South, and they wanted to split the tournament in North and South I reckon the same people who are getting angry now would've gotten angry in that scenario as well

As a Chilean, I am for CONCACAF merge with CONMEBOL and become the AAFF (All-American Football Federation). But the US is too greedy despite they are not good at football (or soccer) and that's fact.

Answer: the USA can provide the facilities to host a continental tournament.

As an Ecuadorian and fellow Hull City supporter, this was a fantastic video about the Copa America.

I disagree with you saying it’s like afcon being hosted in Austria.. I. Latin America we are taught north and South America is one continent. Also North America is not just usa we have Mexico and several Central American countries and Caribbean nations as well

I feel like a merger is coming. This could level the playing field to Europe. Also, in the Hispanosphere, America is a singular continent.

Why is it so hard to comprehend north and south America are part of the AMERICAS… hence Copa America

As a Peruvian, while I like having Copa America be only for South American teams, I don’t mind this new change. Conmebol needs more teams and access to a lucrative market; and concacaf needs more competition and stars. Having concacaf teams actually qualify and make it a round 16 also makes it feel more official than having 2 random teams get invited who tend to never actually take the competition seriously because their starting teams usually are playing in the gold cup for that summer. What I don’t like however is how little Americans know about the history of the Copa America, I noticing that now with how they talk about certain fixtures and conmebol teams. The traditions and culture will take some time to assimilate into but hopefully they don’t get lost. I hope they also don’t make all the Copas be in the USA, hopefully they still switching it up, eat least every other tournament. Overall what I’m trying to say is that out of all the greedy changes that are happening in soccer these days, this is probably one of the lesser evil, as long as the traditions from South America don’t get overshadowed because they’re not deemed marketable enough.

Latin Americans refer to America as one continent. Anglos refer to it as North and South

Concacaf and Conmebol should just merge and have a tournament structure similar to the Euros with qualifiers and all. I think it would help Conmebol financially and Concacaf members would have more chances to improve against better competition.

...but I came here for the history of Bronze Age Ecuador

The only thing that is annoying is having to travel to the US but if kept this format and was hosted in CONMEBOL nation there wouldn't be as much fuss. Better to have CONCACAF nations participate then other conferences so it can be a true Copa "America". Plus it feels like it's being host here because of the World Cup this time around as well as the money.

Don’t understand the European hate towards the USA when it comes to football. Copa America has to evolve for it to compete with the Euros why not include both South and North America? To say the US doesn’t have football culture is insane. Plenty of American’s enjoy watching or playing football and it’s rapidly growing. We’re seeing American players like Pulisic playing for the some of the biggest clubs in the world.

I do understand the skepticism but it also feels like a natural expansion needed to change things up considering a 10 team tournament every 2 years can get stale and predictable? and it does make at least *some* sense getting the 6 best teams from North America to participate honestly, otherwise the group stage for the 10 team copa america becomes almost meaningless

My guy really put the Bolivian team when he was talking bout mexico

TBF, UEFA has 50+ members while CONMEBOL only has 10. It is hard to have a nice tournament format with only 10 teams available.

America needs to have a pan American confederation. Imagine US and Mexican clubs in the Libetadores.

The fact is that it is impossible to have a proper tournament with 10 teams. So they have to invite someone. So why not join the Americas, who hundreds of millions of people across "both" continents view as one anyway, for a tournament to celebrate football, big and small, all across the Americas. Certainly should not be hosted in the US every or most of the time, but greater collaboration (and in my opinion hopefully a total merger) between concacaf and conmebol can help the game on both the men's and women's sides (a continental club competition for the women's game in the Americas would be awesome) and hopefully close the financial gap that uefa has on the rest of the world. I want to see a day where the best players from the Americas will be able to maximize their careers and lives on and off the pitch, much closer to home if they so choose. (Also, you mentioned that the partnership is on the women's side too, so far we had a combined concacaf gold cup with several conmebol nations taking part. Didn't get nearly enough prop but it was a very good tournament)

The question is ... how can we eliminate greed in humans ...

I mostly dislike this new trend stemming from the side of sports that places expansion and profit over history and competition (the Super League in Europe and conference realignment in American college football to name a few) but this is one of the exceptions. Having the Copa America become a true "Americas" tournament between North and South has very little drawback as a whole and seeing it return to a CONMEBOL-only tournament would be slightly disappointing. A 16-team tournament is the perfect way to turn it into a true Euros competitor and helps CONCACAF immensely. A win-win from almost every angle.

The United States have world class stadiums and a large community of football fans. It’s also a safer place to host than all of South American or Central American countries. It will cost cheaper for Copa america and more profit. It’s a no brainer.

Wait a minute! A HITC Sevens video that is under half an hour??? What have you done to Alfie?!

This Copa America had the shittiest fields ever, please, never host any Copa América in USA ever again

CONMEBOL and CONCACAF should merge lowkey, or at the very least share the Copa America and scrap the Gold Cup.