Panama National Football Team – The Highs and the Lows

Guest Contribution – Panama is one of the hottest footballing countries in recent memory. A country who once was one of the weakest nations in Central America has turned things around with an exciting footballing project that has seen them qualify to two of the last three World Cup tournaments and reach the finals of the CONCACAF Nations League.

Despite the ever-growing presence of Panama in top-tier competitions like the World Cup or the CONCACAF Gold Cup, its growth is the perfect example of how hard work and a great project can make you compete against the best in the world.

From a humble footballing nation who once dreamt to go toe-to-toe with the best to a reality where the country continues to produce elite talent, Panama’s story is one for the books.

A Humble Project with Big Aspirations

For much of the twentieth century, and great part of the twenty-first century too, Panama struggled to establish themselves internationally. A very poor domestic football league with very little standards and non-existent competition exposed Panama’s footballing atmosphere. And the national team didn’t help either, with qualifications campaigns ending very early.

However, the twenty-first century changed it all. Suddenly, Panama began to grow, they didn’t reach a World Cup or the late stages of the Gold Cup, but they were coming very close, things were starting to click.

Instead of trying to find their luck, Panama decided to build from the bottom, investing in their league structure and helping teams around the nation improve their youth facilities to ensure their youth prospects could develop correctly. Of course, Panama has now become a common presence in youth competitions, facing teams like the Republic of Ireland in the U-17s World Cup, although, as Ireland bookmakers predicted, they were battered 4-1.

The 2018 Dream

Panama has never had a top-tier star that has played with the best, or has been, one of the best players in the world. Instead, Panama has always been known as the country who had a good team structure, without any standouts.

Its main strengths have always come from team play, that being compact defensive blocks, physical conditioning and set-piece efficiency. Thanks to these, Panama has managed to evolve drastically, earning two World Cup qualifications.

Although this year’s qualification has pleased fans, the 2018 World Cup will forever be part of Panama’s history, not as a footballing nation, but as a country. After an amazing qualifying campaign, Panama managed to clinch their spot at the 2018 Russia World Cup with a last-minute winner that set the whole country on fire. For the first time in their history, Panama was going to play against some of the world’s best.

Sadly, Panama was knocked out at the first time of asking, but nobody expected more, they were just happy to establish themselves amongst the best 32 nations in the world.

Transition, Stagnation, it was Worth it.

But it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows for Panama after reaching the 2018 World Cup. In the tournament, they were the worst team in all the competition, managing a 6-1 loss against England. But what happened after the 2018 World Cup marked an unexpected crisis.

The post-2018 World Cup cycle exposed Panama, the improvements were clear, but there were a lot of things that had to be improved before consolidating themselves as one of CONCACAF’s biggest threats. And it was mainly due to the stagnation of their youth development: the stars that managed to clinch the 2018 World Cup spot were starting to decline in form, and no player was coming in.

This caused Panama to miss the 2022 World Cup entirely, with many fans questioning the true strength of Panama’s new project. However, things turned around very quickly.

In the blink of an eye, Panama managed to do the unimaginable, by reaching the knockout stages of the 2025 Gold Cup. Not to mention one of the biggest milestone in the country’s history: knocking out the USA in the semifinals of the CONCACAF Nations League.

Whilst Panama continues to progress with the aim of making an impact on this years 2026 World Cup, it’s fair to say that Panama is slowly becoming one of CONCACAF’s most elite nations.

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