Canada to learn its qualifying road for World Cup next month

Canada will learn its qualifying road for the 2019 Women’s World Cup at the Sept. 4 draw in Miami for the 2018 CONCACAF Women’s Championship.

The eight-country regional qualifying tournament, set for Oct. 4-17 in North Carolina and Texas, will send three teams from North and Central America and the Caribbean to next year’s Women’s World Cup in France. The fourth-placed team will take part in an intercontinental playoff versus Argentina.

The United States, as host, and second-ranked Canada will play in separate groups. Mexico has also already qualified.

Two teams will come from the Central American Women’s Qualifier that starts Aug. 27, with Costa Rica, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Panama taking part.

Three more countries will come from the Caribbean qualifying round, which starts Aug. 25. The five teams that advance will join Mexico and be placed in three different pots depending on ranking for the draw.

Group B, which features Canada, will play its preliminary round games Oct. 5, 8 and 11 at H-E-B Park in Edinburg, a 9,700-seat stadium.

Group A, which includes the United States, will play its games Oct. 4, 7 and 10 at the 10,000-seat Sahlen’s Stadium at WakeMed Soccer Park in Cary.

The top two finishers in each group cross over to meet in the Oct. 14 semifinals at Toyota Stadium in Frisco. The third-place match and championship game are slated for Oct. 17 at Toyota Stadium.

The two finalists and third-place finisher automatically qualify for the FIFA Women’s World Cup.

The United States has won seven of the nine CONCACAF championships. Canada won the other two and has finished runner-up four times.

Host France, Brazil, Chile, Spain, Italy, China, Thailand, Japan, Korea and Australia have already qualified for the 24-team World Cup.