Mexico said goodbye to their interim coach Jesus Ramirez, replaced by Swiss Sven-Goran Eriksson, with a 7-0 trash over Belize; one week before they earned a 0-2 victory. Now the criticism to El Tri was dismissed.
The entrance of El Salvador has a historic value because after losing 1-0 to Panama away and being down in the second leg in San Salvador, they managed to take a 3-1 win, showing the talents of the side guided by Alexandre Guimaraes.
Regarding Costa Rica and Trinidad & Tobago their victories failed to dispel the doubts about their chances of qualifying for South Africa 2010.
Costa Rica, who played a 2-2 draw against Granada eight days ago, blanked them 3-0 on Saturday in San Jose, ending their streak of twelve matches without winning in more than one year, but their distrustful fans were not completely satisfied.
Trinidad & Tobago outfit, coached by Francisco Maturana, was reborn on Sunday with a 2-0 win over Bermudas away and managed to neutralize their 2-1 defeat in Puerto España.
Honduras, who has Colombian Reinaldo Rueda on the bench, earned one week before their pass as they played a 2-2 with Puerto Rico away after a 4-0 win in the first leg.
The group of twelve countries will be divided into three groups of four to face Stage Three, from August 20 to November 19, was completed by Jamaica, Surinam and Haiti.
Guatemala, with Honduran Ramon Maradiaga on the bench, earned the pass against Santa Lucia on Sunday, taking a 3-1 win. In the first leg, Guatemala claimed a 6-0 victory.
Cuba advanced following a 4-0 win over Antigua and Barbuda in La Habana with a positive result for coach German Reinhold Fanz and top-scorer Roberto Linares. Fanz notched two victories from as many official matches and Linares have netted four goals.
The other unbalanced series among the twelve contested in Stage Two was the first, between USA and Barbados. Bob Bradley’s men thrashed Barbados 8-0 on June 15 in Los Angeles and in the second-leg match they sealed the qualification with a 1-0 narrow victory.
The worst disaster was faced by modest Bahamas, in Series 6, as the Jamaica suffered to identical thrashes: 7-0 in the first leg and 6-0 in the second. In Series 8 Canada failed was strong enough to beat St. Vincent & The Grenadines, 4-1, taking the series 7-1 on aggregate.
Suriman, of Series 10, sealed their qualification with a double win: 1-0 in the first leg and 1-2 in the second match. Haiti, without satisfying their fans, took a narrow 0-1 away win over Netherlands Antilles, and drew scoreless in the second leg.
Stage 2 winners meet in the Semifinal Round of the of the CONCACAF World Cup Qualification that will be composed of three groups of four teams with matches running from 20 August – 19 November 2008.
The top two from each of the three groups will advance to the six-team CONCACAF Final Round scheduled for 11 February - 14 October 2009.
The top three teams from the CONCACAF Final Round in 2009 will automatically qualify for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. CONCACAF's fourth place finisher will play off with CONMEBOL's fifth-place team in a home-and-away series for one of the last berths to the FIFA event.
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