Cuba U23

The bronze at the 2014 Central American and Caribbean Games in Veracruz came the hard way: a semi-final lost to Mexico on penalties, then extra time again in the third-place match against Honduras, which Cuba won 3–1. It remains the side's only medal. Eight years earlier in Cartagena they had reached the same stage and lost it, to Costa Rica.

Between those two afternoons sits the episode that shaped how the team is talked about. During the 2008 CONCACAF Men's Pre-Olympic Tournament in the United States, seven players left the squad inside three days. Five went after the match against the USA in Tampa on 11 March, among them the captain, Yenier Bermúdez, and goalkeeper José Manuel Miranda. Two more went in Orlando before the fixture with Honduras, and Cuba took the field with ten men. A comparable wave followed at the 2015 Olympic qualifying tournament.

The under-23 side has yet to reach an Olympic football tournament: six qualifying campaigns, from 2004 to 2024, ended short. The opponents that stand between them and a place — the USA, Mexico, Panama, Costa Rica — arrive as favourites more or less every time. Cuba did not enter the men's tournament at the Games in 2018 or 2023.

Maikel Reyes and Aricheell Hernández were in the Veracruz squad; Reyes is the name most often attached to that run.

Home is the Estadio Nacional Pedro Marrero in Havana, which holds about 28,000 — 18,000 of them under cover, the rest open to the weather. The red shirts and navy shorts are the senior team's, worn down a level.