Canadian NWT ready to seize opportunity at crucial CONCACAF W Championship

The exhibition matches and celebration tour that followed in the aftermath of the Canadian women's team's gold-medal victory at last summer's Tokyo Olympics are a thing of the past. Now it's time for Canada to shift gears and get down to serious business again.

The CONCACAF W Championship in Monterrey, Mexico, which runs from July 4-18, is a crucially important tournament for Canada, as it serves as the qualifiers for the 2023 FIFA World Cup, while also offering one direct berth for the 2024 Paris Olympics. 

The Canadians, No. 6 in the current FIFA world rankings, kick off Group B action at the CONCACAF competition vs. Trinidad and Tobago (No. 76) on July 5, before taking on Panama (No. 57) on July 8, and wrapping up the first round vs. Costa Rica (No. 37) on July 11. Group A consists of the United States (No. 1), Mexico (No. 26), Jamaica (No. 51) and Haiti (No. 60).

The top two teams in both groups at the end of the round robin advance to the tournament semifinals and also earn automatic berths for next year's World Cup in Australia and New Zealand. The two third-place nations can still qualify for the World Cup via the inter-continental playoffs scheduled for Feb. 17-23, 2023.

Also, the winner of the 2022 CONCACAF W Championship will automatically qualify for the 2024 Paris Olympics and next summer's CONCACAF Gold Cup. The runner-up and winner of the third-place match will face off in a playoff in September, 2023 to determine who'll clinch CONCACAF's other Olympic berth. The winner of that playoff also qualifies for the 2024 CONCACAF Gold Cup.

"There's a lot of pressure to win the tournament because that's the only way you can for sure qualify for both [the World Cup and Olympics]... It's a great opportunity to win the