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2007 Pan American Games Qualifying Procedure  x23
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| Pan American Hockey Federation |
May 4, 2005
Pan American Hockey Federation
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The Pan American Hockey Federation has announced the qualifying procedure for the 2007 Pan American Games to be held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from July 13 to 29, 2007.
It is recognized that all countries in the Pan American Hockey Federation should have the opportunity to qualify for the Pan American Games through a regional tournament held during the two years immediately preceeding the Pan American Games year.
While the 6th South American Championships and the 20th Central American and Caribbean Games will provide this opportunity for most countries, there is no opportunity for countries from North America (Canada and USA).
Taking the above premise into consideration, the following is the official qualification procedure for the men's and women's hockey tournaments at the XV Pan American Games:
1. Host country.
2. The first and second placed countries at the 6th South American Championships (as long as a minimum of four countries participates).
3. The first and second placed countries at the 20th Central American and Caribbean Games (as long as a minimum of four countries participates).
4. Two countries not already qualified under paragraphs 1 - 3 above, based on final rankings at the 2nd Pan American Cup.
5. The eighth country will be determined after the conclusion of the 6th South American Championships or the 20th CAC Games (whichever is held later). Should Canada (women) or USA (men) NOT have qualified under the procedure outlined in paragraphs 1 - 4 above, then that men's and/or women's team will play a three-match series at a neutral venue against the men's or women's country which would have qualified for the Pan American Games as a third country in accordance with paragraph 4 above, with the winner filling the eighth (8th) place in the respective men's or women's tournament.
Note:
- If there are less than four participants in either the 6th South American Championships or the 20th CAC Games, an additional country will qualify based on rankings in the 2nd Pan American Cup.
- Canada (women) and USA (men) finished 3rd and 7th respectively in the 2004 Pan American Cup and will have to qualify under paragraph 4. Based on the final rankings at the 2004 Pan American Cup, Canada (women) may qualify as one of the two under paragraph 4. However, the USA (men) are unlikely to qualify through this process and will be allowed the opportunity to do so via the three-match series against the country that would have qualified as a third country under paragraph 4.
For more information, please contact the PAHF Competitions Committee or visit the Pan American Hockey Federation web site at www.panamhockey.org
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hockey player
05-05-2005 7:58 am
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i agree with you canadian. this is very confusing.
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mo33
05-05-2005 9:53 am
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qualifying
It seems to be the only way Panam can serve the interests of all their respective masters. Heaven forbid a Panam Games without the big 3, so lets develop a convulted system. At least the hosts automatically qualify unlike the OGs, but surely this would be easier if the US & Canada either join the CAC qualify or they play each other in a series. Its not our fault that in the C'bean there are 8-10 countries but only 2 can qualify or in South America there are a similar amount and again only 2 can qualify. This smells again like devising the qualifying procdures to ensure certain teams always participate so that again certain teams maintain the status quo.
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Clear
05-05-2005 1:53 pm
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re: Canadian
The Canadian women will qualify based on paragraph #4. Argentina win SA - thereby qualifying Canada and the USA.
The US Men will play the highest ranked team from the 2004 PanAm Cup that has not already qualified.
Yeah?
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Pancho
05-05-2005 4:39 pm
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Clear
For the record, the official finish at the Pan Am Cup was 1) Argentina 2) Canada 3)Chile 4) Trinidad 5) Netherlands Antilles 6) Mexico 7) USA.
Cuba and Barbados will need to finish in the top two in their qualifier if they are going to go (Cuba no-showed for the Pan Am Cup). If the Cubans do happen to go to the qualifier, I would pick Cuba and Mexico to qualify.....the field for the Pan Am Games would then be Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Canada, Cuba, Mexico, Trinidad, and a play-off between USA and Netherlands Antilles. If Cuba doesn't show up, I would see the battle for the top two spots being between Mexico, Trinidad, Netherlands Antilles, and Barbados. The USA would play one of these teams.
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Sherlock
05-06-2005 10:42 am
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Women?
Pancho, what are your predictions for the women?
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Pancho
05-06-2005 4:44 pm
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Clear's Request
Pan Am Cup Results...1)Argentina 2) USA 3) Canada 4) Uruguay 5) Chile 6)Barbados 7) Netherlands Antilles 8) Trinidad & Tobago. The Central American/Caribbean Tournament should be very even. Assuming Cuba attends, I would predict the order of finish to be almost a deadheat between Barbados, Mexico, and Cuba with Netherlands Antilles and Trinidad just behind them. Line Up for Pan Am Games would be Brazil, Argentina, USA, Canada, Uruguay, Chile, and the top two finishers at the Central American Games.
Why do the Pan American Games have just eight teams and not ten ? It would be just as easy to have two pools of five.
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Charrua!!!
05-06-2005 7:40 pm
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Chile, no te molestes en clasificar, que despues de gastar un camion de dolares para entrenar, igual va Uruguay y te deja pegado....
Save the Hockey Uruguayo!!!!
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USA Fan
05-09-2005 1:23 am
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Questions....
1. When would the playoff between the USA & the other country be played?
2. Where would it be played? (This could give an unfair advantage to one of the teams - i.e. if it is played against a Carribean team & is played in a different Carribean country that team would have an advantage...)
3. Whichever team the USA plays will have played in a competitive competition recently (namely, their region's qualifier) - the USA, to my understanding, have not played ANY competitive games, or even any games at all, since the Pan Am Cup last year....not the best preperations to try to qualify for the Pan Am Games!! The team should be going to AT LEAST one Carribean country to play & to one South American country so that they are well prepared to play this playoff!! What is the USFHA doing about this??
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Peter Munsing
05-09-2005 6:39 pm
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Like to hear from the S.American Countries on how travel funded
I'm sure the S.American countries face the biggest hurdles as they would have the farthest distances to travel to their regional mathces/championships. How is this funded? I ask because the question "USA Fan" asks presupposes USFHA has the funds to send it's teams around S.AMerica--I think this would be good, but then I feel travel can always broaden the mind--and often the skills. However, USFHA may not have the funds, especially if it ever wants to have it's teams do an Oz/NZ tour or SAfrica tour and really get schooled. The reality is how do we fund it--so I ask those who've had to come up with travel across significant distances.
So I ask those involved in S. American field hockey to tell us what your system involves--does Argentina, for instance, have to play Venezuela, and if so where do they play and how do they fund the travel? What countries play? Is the cost of travel a barrier to entry from other countries in your continent --Paraguay, Bolivia, and Peru, for instance?
Perhaps once we know a bit more the US can realistically look at trying to get some outside funding for a periodic play against Carribean and S.American Teams--but I'd doubt that USFHA will have the funds--as it is U-16 and other players fund a fair amount of their own travel.
As to the complexity, probably a flow chart would best describe this--any systems people out there (yes, you can also do a satirical chart well, I'm sure--what do you say, PFH?)
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CPo
05-10-2005 4:59 pm
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To Peter
The USA would travel by plane peter!!! Its how most people travel across significant distances!
I would assume that USFHA has enough money to fund any tour, its the question IF they will do it!
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Peter Munsing
05-10-2005 9:20 pm
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Not across the Andes by llama? Seriously.....
The USFHA has limited funding for touring. That's why US teams haven't done more, though they should. They haven't spent significant time touring Australia or Europe. As I mentioned, the players have often paid for all or most of their flights (yes, dear CPo, I do understand that flight is an option). I'd like to know how S.Amrican countries ,which certainly face a logistical challenge have funded it--obviously they may know something we don't. Certainly, I don't think we should assume we have nothing to learn from, e.g., the Argentine teams which have done quite well, especially in comparison to US. So, I for one would like to know how they do that which the US cannot do, or does with great difficulty. Especially as we look to perhaps having more hemispheric play.
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USA Fan
05-10-2005 9:36 pm
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Funding
I think it's fair to say that we all, Peter included I hope, would take it for granted that the team would travel by plane....although it was a pretty funny response!!
I can only assume that the USFHA has the funding available to send the men's team on tour as if the U21's had qualified for the Jnr. World Cup there would have had to have been funding available to the team. The question is what is this money being allocated to now?? Is the women's program getting it - perhaps they will be able to go on another tour....south africa this time perhaps!??!!!
At least the men's program has a strong domestic league structure to fall back on so that we know the players are getting plenty of competitive hockey.................................................................!!!!!!!!!
Would be interesting to hear from some of the guys on the current team to know what they think or if they know more than the rest of us???
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alk3
05-10-2005 11:10 pm
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USFHA Travel
Peter -
Considering that in the past 9 months the US Junior teams have traveled to Chile, Cuba, Canada, and California, and every tour has been at minimal cost to the players, I would say that your question has already been answered, and USFHA does not need any travel tips. There is no need to ask the South American teams for advice - we have travel agents who specialize in that type of thing. Furthermore, USFHA has put considerable resources in terms of coaching staff both programs and only one has been successful. How much more money do you expect USFHA, or any other organization, to sink into the men's program after the results of the past two years? Seventh at Pan-Am's and fourth at juniors is hardly a record I would take to an outside sponsor. The only chance the men have at playing outdoor hockey on the world stage is if New York managed to out-bribe all of the other bidders for the 2012 Olympics. To use a tired, but very applicable metaphor, if the USFHA were a company and one of its divisions produced numbers like the men's team, they would cut their losses and downsize. You can't honestly expect a fully funded training period, even if they qualify what is their next objective? Break the top five? In reality USFHA would rather see them not qualify, not because of sexism, but because they put a drain on the rest of the system that takes away from the women. Did you see what Terry had to say about the men? Essentially he dismissed the current generation of players, and rightly so. Although, I do believe it's feasible that if they started training now, by 2025 the men would be almost guaranteed a spot in the Semi's - a monumental accomplishment by their standards. No disrespect intended towards the men's team - a good group of guys, but they don't have a prayer.
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Curious
05-11-2005 10:13 am
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Alk3
I am interested in comments you attribute to Terry Walsh "essentially he dismissed the current generation of players" etc. Where did you read that or hear that? I would like to see it for myself if it is on-line.
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Yan Huckendubler
05-11-2005 10:56 am
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Comparison between Sport Organization and companies
To Alk3,
You seem to be convinced that the comparison between a National Sport Organization and a company having to produce (financial) results is “very applicable”.
I think, on the contrary, that it is not applicable considering than the NSOs (e.g. USFHA in the States and FHC in Canada) have vocation to service their Members, who are paying fees.
If a sector of legitimate activity (men, women, youth, domestic leagues, i.e. the “divisions” of your company) is not successful, I would say that the NSO has the mandate to try to improve it, even though the results are in a dim future.
Sport is a cyclical activity. In the 1980s, the Canadian women were in the leading pack in the world, while our men were nowhere to be found. At end of the 1990s, the tendency had shifted, our men finished 8th at the World Cup and went to the Olympic Games, while our women were in a downhill slide. The problem in small hockey nations (like Canada and the US) is that the cycle is long, when we would all want to see quick return on our actions.
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Peter Munsing
05-11-2005 6:13 pm
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Here we are, scrapping over scraps---
I appologize to US fan and AK 3 if I have been so dense as to mistate my point and question. No, I don't expect USFHA to provide additional funding. Yes, my experience is that junior players do pay for a significant part of their expenses.
My point in asking the question was that the US teams do have distances to travel--just as teams do in S. America. I thought that perhaps S. American teams had worked out sponsorship and funding.
As to AK3's analogy to a coroporation, it seems to be the USOC approach--produce gold or die. Well, by that token hockey's dead--I don't recall the US women even making Athens or did I miss something? US corporations take the short view. Asian and European corporations take the long view. I'd leave the analogy there before it get's inappropriate.
The suggestion that "US Men have a well developed league to fall back on" puzzles me--there is the NAPL, but that also has distance problems, and needs to perhaps have some international play to ramp itself up. The west coast has a league. But clubs in Chicago, Atlanta, and Houston all have many miles to travel to find other teams to play against. So here also I feel we might learn from the S.American countries.
As to why the women don't have a league, I leave that to others to discuss--most clubs on the USFHA site are women, many women only.
And that is precisely because we haven't done as well as some of them have--I thought my post was quite free of any patriotic bombast--but if it wasn't let me note that we
don't do as well. That being said, before everyone dumps on the players I'd note that many clubs can only practice once, perhaps twice a week. If our players had the Oz opportunity of practicing on turf 4-5 days a week, and have a variety of clubs to play matches against, let alone not face hostility and banning in schools, and had the level of coaching available in Oz, I think they'd not post a bad showing.
So rather than fight over the scraps USOC gives us, or make sour comments about the players not getting gold or near it, why not have some positive comments that deal realistically with the situation we have, and let's invite comments by those who know about S. American Hockey which has done better than the U.S.
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alk3
05-12-2005 3:08 pm
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Curious
The most recent issue of Field Hockey News - the USFHA magazine, contains an interview with Terry. The question posed to Terry was along the lines of 'What are your thoughts on competition opportunities for the men's team?' and his response was, don't quote me on this but I believe it's true to his message, 'It would take a significant upset for the men to qualify for the Olympics. The most effective way to make them competitive would be the development of a grass-roots system and a domestic league.'
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USA Fan
05-12-2005 10:41 pm
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Good on ya Terry.......
WOW Terry must be a genius!!!! That's the answer: throw away the careers of all the guys on the current team, who have sacrificed an enormous amount because they are unlikely to make it to the Olympics....& just start a really competitive league system with all of those other guys who are itching to play field hockey!! The problem in the US is not that there is not a good league system, which there is not!!, but that outside of the men's team & about half of the U21s there is absolutely no depth in talent!!
Yes a grass roots system needs to be put in place, but obviously Terry does not know Americans very well: they do not care about sports that they are not the best in the world at. Fact. If the kids have no 'role models' to look up to in the US then they will not be interested. The USFHA should use current players, Pat Harris wouldn't be a bad place to start, to promote the sport in schools that are near good faciiities, where perhaps it is a popular sport for girls nearby, and show that it is a game played by good athletic MEN TOO. Will current players be happy to do this if the USFHA totally neglects them - I doubt it!!
Just my opinion, but I'm sure it would do a huge amount to help grass roots hockey in the US.....
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CPO
05-12-2005 10:45 pm
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Peter Peter Peter...
Where did you hear that the US Juniors "pay for a significant part of their expenses." Anytime I have traveled withe juniors to any tour, not a dime came out of my pocket for, food, flight, and transport. Where are you getting this info. When the juniors came back from cuba they had new uniforms, warm ups, ect. all piad for!? What expirience do you have with the junior team? Maybe u-16 has to fund more, but that is the youth team, juniors are u-21....Let's not look to other countries about our club system, because if Im not mistakin, Moorepark has great club system where they can use the turf 7 days a week if they wanted too. Don't analize the problem in such depth, it all comes down to money...SHOW ME THE MONEY!!!!!
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Geezer
05-13-2005 10:39 am
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USA Fan
Interesting comments...your statement "outside of the men's team and about half of the U21's there is absolutely no depth in talent" needs amplification. There is NO active men's team. Nothing has been planned, done, or scheduled for this group for over a year (the disastrous seventh place at the Pan Am Cup was apparently their swan song). The program has atrophied to the point of non-existence through neglect. That the Under 21's (a team that included a number of players only 16 and 17 years old) were able to come within seconds of qualifying for the World Junior championships was attributable to the fact that the core group of this team was kept going through the efforts of Dave Harris and his Mystery Club. USA Fan, the talent pool is probably a lot weaker today than you realize.
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Peter Munsing
05-14-2005 2:31 pm
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Any S. Americans out there?
To CPO, my experience is that to fly out for trials, games we paid. I'm glad your fare was paid for--but that doesn't mean the USFHA is a money tree. Point is, the S. Americans are doing it right, so let's hear from them.
I don't expect USFHA to come up with the answers or solutions, and I'd like to hear what other countries have done as I think it's up to those that care about hockey to try to help ourselves while we work for USFHA to reform it's attitude. Then if USFHA can come up with solutions or money so much the better, but I don't believe in holding my breath until someone else does the work.
The players and coaches have done a lot given the thin pool. While USA Fan has some good points, Americans have taken to rugby which isn't a sport that the US does well in. Look at the growth of soccer, which until recently we didn't do well in. Fencing is also growing--again a sport we haven't done well in since the post WWII influx of emigre citizens. There are other sports. Having the dinosaur of baseball and the 400lb gorilla of foootball to be fed, clothed, coached, fielded and funded hampers all sports, not just ours. But many of them grow. Look at all the states where there are no hockey clubs at all, let alone mens clubs. So I really do think that rather than blame this coach, that group of players, the USFHA (though it may be fun), let's see what we can learn because if there's one thing we all seem to agree on it's that we aren't doing very well now.
Rather than argue about how poorly we are doing, like some Monty Python sketch (e.g.,"Poor?why we're terrible!" "Ooh, terrible are we--putting on airs--totally, abjectly pathetic, and hopeless, and without any redeeming value is what we are." " Flatterer, egotist, --love to be pathetic, lucky to be hopeless, we would." etc. etc.etc.), let's try to learn from others who, despite not having some of our advantages, have done as well if not better than we have. We may find out they were better off but I doubt it.
If your business is doing poorly you can blame the workers, the customers, fellow decision makers, fates, the markets, or you can figure out a way out and up; looking at someone in a similar situation who's done better--like the Argentinians have in hockey of late--is one way. There are others.
So it is that I'd like to hear from those familiar with S. American hockey,as I think we have a lot to learn, particularly from Argentina--how have they grown it? Are there problems about racial/economic level inclusiveness like we have here? How have those barriers been handled, if they have? (and if anyone from Poland, Korea, Belgium or China is reading or from any other country that has good ideas let's hear them).
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USA Fan
05-14-2005 6:28 pm
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Geezer
Apparently you haven't read all of the posts on this thread, otherwise you would see that I noted in my first post that the Men's team have not played any games since the disatrious Pan Am Cup.....read before you speak!!
But just because they had ONE terrible tournament does not mean that they should be considered useless. If my memory serves me well, although they did not win a game, they played quite well in Malaysia just a month prior to the Pan Am Cup - a team that was at the time 15 places above them in the world rankings.
With the help of some better coaching many of this group, with the injection of SOME of the jnrs (the senior team should certainly not be replaced by the U21s - a.k.a. Mystery) this team could do itself justice. & I am certainly not knocking Mystery or Dave Harris because they did fantastic (except against Mexico!!) in the Jnrs in Cuba.
That said if club hockey is to progress in the US, perhaps those in charge of the Moorpark league should consider breaking the team up: this may be unpopular with some but it would make the league more competitive AND help the young players in Mystery to play with more mature & experienced players like Shawn Nak. who could teach them a thing or too....
Again these are just my opinions, but they COULD improve hockey in the US
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