Nine out of the 41 Copa America competitions, including every Copa since 1993, has been a true "Cup Style" tournament, with a group-based first round, then quarter-finals, semi-finals, and a final match. Thus, one might say Sunday's match is the ninth Copa America Final. One should also include, however, the four times out of 28 that the "League format" Copa ended up in a tie in points for the top two teams, and the winner was determined by a play-off. Thus, really it will be the 13th Copa America FINAL.

In order to help you with this … and add to your work … the four times you mention are what years? I understand these are tie-breakers, prior to 1975?

Technically, a “Cup Style” tournament …can have a couple different formatts, for example:

1) The Champions League and the UEFA Cup where it is played as home and away and only the final is played in one game.
or
2) The Libertadores Cup and The Sudamericana Cup where all matches in the knock-put stages, including the final, are played on a home and away formatt.

Having said this … the tournaments of 1975, 1979 and 1983 used the formatt of Libertadores or Sudamericana as in #2 Hence, these are 3 finals not included in your count of finals. As an extra description to these three finals … the number of points on both games decided the winner. If they tied in points, an extra game was forced to determine the winner. If the 3rd game, played at a neutral site, was tied … only then the goal average of the games was used. In 1979, Paraguay won the title even thou the 3rd game was a 0-0.

Also, I must add that prior to 1993, on 1987, the tournament also had a final, in which Uruguay beat Chile 1-0. Chile had been the surprise of the tourny beating Brazil 4-0 in the first round and hence winning their group. Uruguay, reigning champ, joined the three top qualifiers of the group stage, and became champion playing only 2 games, as the reigning Champ would join the semis automatically.

I hope this helps.

In order to help you with this … and add to your work … the four times you mention are what years? I understand these are tie-breakers, prior to 1975?

I'm glad you had me look it up, because I MISSED ONE!

There were five tie-breaker playoffs:

1919, 1922, 1937, 1949, 1953

I'll fix this in the main article.

My main source is:

http://www.rsssf.com/tabless/sachampfull.html

Technically, a “Cup Style” tournament …can have a couple different formatts, for example:1) The Champions League and the UEFA Cup where it is played as home and away and only the final is played in one game. or2) The Libertadores Cup and The Sudamericana Cup where all matches in the knock-put stages, including the final, are played on a home and away formatt.

I guess there is a third type too, where all games are treated as single knock-out stages, like the Euro Cup. No compensation for home field advantage is given. This is evidenced by the fact that 52.5% (!!!!!) of all tournaments that had a clear home-field advangtage resulted in a host champion (20 out of 38).

Having said this … the tournaments of 1975, 1979 and 1983 used the formatt of Libertadores or Sudamericana as in #2 Hence, these are 3 finals not included in your count of finals. As an extra description to these three finals … the number of points on both games decided the winner. If they tied in points, an extra game was forced to determine the winner. If the 3rd game, played at a neutral site, was tied … only then the goal average of the games was used. In 1979, Paraguay won the title even thou the 3rd game was a 0-0.

You're right, that makes it a little more complicated.

1975:

COL - PER 1:0 in Colombia
PER - COL 2:0 in Peru
PER - COL 1:0 in Venezuela

I'm not sure why the third game was played, since the point total was PER 2 : 1 COL after the second game. Any ideas?

1979:

PAR - CHI 3:0 in Paraguay
CHI - PAR 1:0 in Chile
PAR - CHI 0:0 in Argentina

Paraguay is Champion based on goal difference (3:1)

1983:

URU - BRA 2:0 in Uruguay
BRA - URU 1:1 in Brasil

So, it's true then that there have been 19 total final games, but I would probably still say there have been 14 Copa America Finals ...it is in the same sense that the NBA finals are actually as many of 7 individual games, but that particular matchup is called "the finals" ...it is very confusing either way one considers it. I will try to make a footnote which clarifies it as much as possible what I mean by a final.

I don't believe any other Copas were done in this fashion, but I haven't fully checked it. Can anyone else look into it?

Also, I must add that prior to 1993, on 1987, the tournament also had a final, in which Uruguay beat Chile 1-0.

I think I included 1987 in my original count of "Cup style" tournaments. I'll recount though to be sure.

I hope this helps.

Your comments help very much! THANKS!

I didn`t know much about Copa America history, thus this article was highly informative and interesting for me. Very good work!

Nice little bit of history Robert. Missed the bit about the tournament being created to celebrate Argentina's First Centenary (100 years of independence) or did you just leave it out as irrelevant? All the best. Pach

Nice little bit of history Robert. Missed the bit about the tournament being created to celebrate Argentina's First Centenary (100 years of independence) or did you just leave it out as irrelevant? All the best. Pach

Left it out because I really wasn't writing an article about the history of the tournament itself. Maybe that would be good to add in though.