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National player Damion Lowe and team manager Roy Simpson have expressed optimism about Jamaica's chances of qualification to the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar.
CONCACAF expanded the final round from six to eight teams with Jamaica seeded for the newly formed octagon.
The hexagon which has served as the final round for World Cup qualifying in the region, has been expanded from six to eight teams.
Mexico, the United States, Costa Rica, Jamaica and Honduras are the top five ranked CONCACAF nations, and have automatically been placed in the final round. The final three places will be filled by the three second round winners.
The six second round winners will come from round one which comprises 30 teams where teams ranked sixth to 35th in the region will compete in six groups of five. The first round of the qualifiers will kick off in October this year.
The second round will commence march 2021, while the newly formed octagon which includes Jamaica, will kick off in June 2021.
The other windows for the qualifiers are September, October and November 2021 and January and March 2022.
With seven games home and away, the Reggae Boyz would play 14 games, compared to the ten they played the last time they were in the “hex” for the 2014 qualifiers.
The top three teams in the final round will book their ticket to Qatar, while the 4th place team will head into the intercontinental playoffs in June 2022.
Despite the increase in games and less FIFA windows to work with, Reggae Boy defender Damion Lowe is confident in the quality of the squad to book a second World Cup berth.
Team manager of the Reggae Boyz, Roy Simpson is relieved to have the final round of the qualifiers set for June next year instead of late 2020.
Meanwhile, the 2021 edition of the Gold Cup has been shifted from July 2 to 25 next year to July 10 to August 1, 2021.
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