The Copa Centroamericana (, Spanish for "Central American Cup") was the main association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of the ''Unión Centroamericana de Fútbol'' ( UNCAF), the sport's Central American governing body. Held every two years since

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, in the years before and after the FIFA World Cup tournaments, it was originally called the UNCAF Nations Cup (), changing to the latter name in

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. The tournament consisted of two stages. In the group round of the tournament finals, the seven teams competed in two round-robin groups, one of four teams and the other of three, for points, with the top two teams in each group proceeding. These four teams qualified for the semifinal stage of the final round, where the winners advanced into the final while the losers disputed a third-place match. The fifth-place match was disputed between the third-ranked teams of the group stage. Depending on their performance in the Copa Centroamericana, teams then went on to participate in other competitions, such as the CONCACAF Gold Cup and the

Copa América The Copa América ( en, America Cup) or CONMEBOL Copa América, known until 1975 as the South American Football Championship (''Campeonato Sudamericano de Fútbol'' in Spanish and ''Campeonato Sul-Americano de Futebol'' in Portuguese), is the t ...

. The 14 Central American Championship tournaments were won by four different national teams:

Costa Rica Costa Rica (, ; ; literally "Rich Coast"), officially the Republic of Costa Rica ( es, República de Costa Rica), is a country in the Central American region of North America, bordered by Nicaragua to the north, the Caribbean Sea to the no ...

were the most successful national team of the competition with eight victories.

Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. The republic of Honduras is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Oce ...

won four titles.

Guatemala Guatemala ( ; ), officially the Republic of Guatemala ( es, República de Guatemala, links=no), is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the north and west by Mexico; to the northeast by Belize and the Caribbean; to the east by H ...

and Panama won one title each. Costa Rica and Honduras were the only sides in history to win consecutive titles, with the former winning an unprecedented three titles in

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and

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. The final tournament was held in

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, after which it was absorbed into the CONCACAF Nations League.

History

Due to the success of the Costa Rica national football team at the

1990 FIFA World Cup The 1990 FIFA World Cup was the 14th FIFA World Cup, a quadrennial football tournament for men's senior national teams. It was held from 8 June to 8 July 1990 in Italy, the second country to host the event for a second time (the first being Me ...

and the approaching

1994 FIFA World Cup The 1994 FIFA World Cup was the 15th FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national soccer teams. It was hosted by the United States and took place from June 17 to July 17, 1994, at nine venues across the country. The United States ...

to be hosted in the United States, the CONCACAF Congress in

Kingston Kingston may refer to: Places * List of places called Kingston, including the five most populated: ** Kingston, Jamaica ** Kingston upon Hull, England ** City of Kingston, Victoria, Australia ** Kingston, Ontario, Canada ** Kingston upon Thames, ...

, Jamaica decided to stage a continental championship itself; the CONCACAF Gold Cup was ratified on August 18, 1990. Costa Rica were given a bye into the competition due to its first place placing at the

1989 CONCACAF Championship The 1989 CONCACAF Championship was the tenth and final edition of the CONCACAF Championship held under the format of serving as qualification to the 1990 FIFA World Cup and having no host nation for the final round. The tournament would be succee ...

, which also served as a qualification phase for the World Cup hosted by Italy. However, due to mainly economic reasons, the United States were chosen as the venue for the continental tournament. During that same conference, the qualification format for the Central American associations were also decided on. The final qualification round of the Central American zone had two bids: the United States and Costa Rica. Costa Rica, now three-time CONCACAF champions and to celebrate their

anniversary An anniversary is the date on which an event took place or an institution was founded in a previous year, and may also refer to the commemoration or celebration of that event. The word was first used for Catholic feasts to commemorate saints ...

of the nation's World Cup performance by its team, was named by CONCACAF and UNCAF as the host country of the inaugural UNCAF Nations Cup tournament on February 19, 1991.

Results

# Placings decided on a round-robin basis.

Teams reaching the top four

''* Hosts''

All-time Copa Centroamericana table

References

External links

* * {{International football Nations Cup CONCACAF Gold Cup qualification Defunct international association football competitions in North America Recurring sporting events established in 1991 Recurring sporting events disestablished in 2017 1991 establishments in North America 2017 disestablishments in North America