TheCuba national football team (Spanish:Selección de fútbol de Cuba) representsCuba in men's internationalfootball, which is governed by theAsociación de Fútbol de Cuba (English:Football Association of Cuba) founded in 1924. It has been an affiliate member ofFIFA since 1932 and a founding affiliate member ofCONCACAF since 1961. Regionally, it is an affiliate a member ofCFU in the Caribbean Zone. It was a member ofNAFC (1946–1955) and later a member ofCCCF (1955–1961), the two predecessor confederations of CONCACAF. It was also a member ofPFC, the former unified confederation of the Americas.
Cuba participated once in theFIFA World Cup in1938, becoming the first Caribbean team to play in the competition. It is one of twelve CONCACAF teams to have participated in the World Cup and also one of four CONCACAF teams to advanced to the knockout stage of the competition, reaching the quarter-finals.In the round of 16, Cuba defeatedRomania in a replay, 2–1, after drawing against them 3–3. They were then eliminated in the quarter-finals bySweden, 8–0. Cuba has not returned to the World Cup since.
The team's best performance in CONCACAF's premier continental competition was finishing fourth place in the1971 CONCACAF Championship.Regionally, Cuba finished as runners-up in theNAFC Championship as hosts in1947 (organized by NAFC, the former North American confederation), won theCaribbean Cup in2012 (organized by CFU, the regional body for the Caribbean Zone) and also won the gold medal at theCentral American and Caribbean Games in1930.
Cuba's first World Cup qualification campaign was for the1934 World Cup inItaly. All of the CONCACAF entrants were placed in Group 11. The winner of a best-of-three tournament between the two weakest nations, Cuba andHaiti would produce a winner to play 1930 qualifiersMexico in another round of best-of-three. The winner of that would play 1930 semi-finalists theUnited States of America for a place in the finals. All of the matches between Cuba and Haiti in the first round were staged at Parc Leconte inPort-au-Prince, Haiti, on 28, 1 and 4 January–February 1934. Cuba won the first match 3–1 with Mario Lopez opening from a penalty andHector Socorro scoring the second. The second match was a 1–1 draw with Lopez equalising in the 85th minute. In the final match, Cuba won 6–0 with two Lopez goals, one from Hector Socorro and one from his brother Francisco.
The second round againstMexico consisted of three matches atParque Necaxa inMexico City. Its first match, on 4 March 1934, saw Mexico go 3–0 up with a hat-trick byDionisio Mejia, his goals scored in the 12th, 14th and 16th minutes. Mario Lopez scored twice for Cuba with one in each half, but Mexico won 3–2. A week later, Mejia scored another hat-trick as Mexico won 5–0, and seven days later, Mexico won 4–1 after Lopez opened the scoring in the 15th minute. Mexico did not qualify, their 4–2 play-off defeat to the United States was held in Rome during the finals, as the two teams had forgotten to stage it earlier.
The decision to stage the1938 World Cup inFrance was poorly received in the Americas, who had hoped for it to return to South America after the 1934 World Cup in Italy. All nations in South America exceptBrazil withdrew, and all CONCACAF nations except Cuba, thus the two qualified by default.
The tournament was held as a straight knock-out tournament of 16 nations. Cuba were drawn to play their first-ever World Cup finals match againstRomania (who were making their third finals appearance) atStade du T.O.E.C. inToulouse, on 5 June 1938.Silviu Bindea put Romania ahead after 35 minutes andHector Socorro equalised nine minutes later. With three minutes remaining,Tomás Fernández gave Cuba the lead, but within a minuteIuliu Baratky forced extra time with a Romanian equaliser. Romania went 3–2 up in extra-time byȘtefan Dobay's goal on 105 minutes, butJuan Tuñas equalised for Cuba with three minutes of extra-time remaining.
The replay was held at the same stadium, on 9 June. This was at the same time asSwitzerland's 4–2 replay win overGermany. Dobay put Romania 1–0 up at half-time with a 35th-minute goal, but in the second half Cuba equalised through Socorro in the 51st minute. Six minutes later, Carlos Oliviera scored the winning goal and it ended 2–1.In the quarter-final, Cuba lost 8–0 toSweden atStade du Fort Carre in Antibes, on 12 June. Sweden'sTore Keller andGustav Wetterström each scored hat-tricks.[4]
TheNAFC Championship 1949 served as CONCACAF's qualification group for the1950 World Cup inBrazil. Cuba, the United States of America and Mexico played each other twice in a tournament held inMexico City in September 1949. The top two would qualify. Cuba came third and did not qualify, their only point was gained from their second match, a 1–1 draw against the United States on 14 September. Cuba did not compete in World Cup qualification again until 1966, already underCastro's regime. They returned to participation in qualification for1978, but the 1982 qualifiers represented a significant breakthrough- Cuba reached the final round of qualifying, and were only two points short of reaching the1982 World Cup. In recent years, Cuban football has seen an improvement in results.
They reached the quarter-finals of the2003 Gold Cup (where they were beaten by the United States) by defeating Canada 2–0 in the Group stage. During the2006 World Cupqualifiers, Cuba facedCosta Rica and were only eliminated on away goals. They held Costa Rica to a draw in Havana 2–2 and later battled it out for a 1–1 draw in Costa Rica.
During the2010 World Cupqualifiers, Cuba facedAntigua and Barbuda and the match ended in a 3–3 draw. Later in Pedro Marreo, Cuba won 4–1 to advance to the semi-final round of the CONCACAF World Cup qualifiers. Cuba was with the United States,Trinidad and Tobago andGuatemala. Cuba finished in the fourth place with only one victory against Guatemala 2–1 with a goal scored by Aliannis Urgellés.They finished in third place in the2010 Caribbean Cup to take a place in the2011 Gold Cup. In 2012, Cuba won theCaribbean Cup for the first time.
For the2014 World Cup, the Cuban team qualified directly to the Third round as one of the six highest ranked teams and were placed in Group C withHonduras,Panama, andCanada. Although the Cuban team had several close games, they ended their qualification process with one draw and five defeats (losing home and away to Canada and Honduras and drawing to Panama in Havana in their final game after losing inPanama City). Their only goal of the qualifying campaign came from Alberto Gomes against Panama in the final game of the group stage.
Defection and economic migration by Cuban athletes
In 2008, defections occurred during two separate tournaments held in the United States. In March, seven players from the U-23 national football, includingYeniel Bermúdez,Yordany Álvarez andYendry Díaz defected during the 2008 CONCACAF Olympic Qualifying tournament while the team was based in Tampa, FL. In October, two days before the country's World Cup Qualifier versus the US,Reynier Alcántara andPedro Faife walked away from the team's hotel near Washington, D.C.
INJ Player withdrew from the squad due to an injury. PRE Preliminary squad. RET Player retired from the national team. SUS Player is serving suspension. WD Player withdrew from the squad due to non-injury issue.
Official regional competition organized byNAFC. It was a predecessor confederation of CONCACAF, affiliated with FIFA as the former governing body of football in North America, from 1946 to 1961.