The Copa America is the biggest tournament in South America for the national teams in CONMEBOL. It is the equivalent to the Euro Cup organized by UEFA and the AFCON in Africa. This tournament is played every four years and lately the host nation is randomly decided. The tournament has 99 years of rich football history.
This 2015 edition will take place in Chile, but it wasn't supposed to be that way. Brazil had been announced as the host
1) Tournament's History
It was in 1916 that four teams gathered in Uruguay to celebrate the 100-year independence of that country. Chile, Uruguay and Brazil were the squads invited to the South American Championship of Nations, now known as the Copa America. Due to the success of that tournament, CONMEBOL was created shortly after and the tournament was organized every year.
Uruguay won the first edition of the tournament
Over the years, the tournament has been growing at the same speed that CONMEBOL kept growing. It wasn't until 1975 that the tournament adopted the name it is known by now. The format of the tournament kept changing. Some years it would have a fixed venue and in others, it would not.
From 1987 to 2001 the tournament was set to be played every two years. Starting in 1993, CONMEBOL would invite two guests to participate in the tournament. Since that time, Mexico and another team from CONCACAF are usually the ones that participate in this championship. Uruguay has the most titles with 15 so far.
2) Competition Format
This year, there are 12 teams participating in this upcoming Copa America in Chile. Ten of them are the ones belonging to CONMEBOL and the two guests are Mexico and Jamaica. There are three groups of four teams each. The group stage consists in three games and the best two teams of each group, plus the two best thirds will make it to the quarter-finals. In the knock-out stages there is no extra time, just penalty kicks if needed.
None of these teams had to qualify for the tournament
3) Facts on the Ball
The name of the ball is Cachaña, which means "successful dribble" and it was developed by NIKE, an official sponsor. Not many South American teams have NIKE as their uniform supplier. The colors of the ball represent certain aspects of the host nation. Red represents the people, blue is for the skies above Chile and white is for the Andes mountains that run across the country.
This is what the game ball looks like 
4) Venues and Games
The tournament will be played in eight different cities across Chile. Estadio Nacional in Santiago, with a renewed capacity of 70,000, will be hosting both the opening game and the final of the tournament. There is a total of nine stadiums that will be used for this tournament and a total of 26 games will be played.
Estadio Nacional is one of the nine stadiums to be used for this tournament
5) Mascot
Zincha is the name of the mascot that you will be seeing during the tournament that runs from June 11 to July 4. He is the combination of a fox and a fan and it was the people of Chile who voted to come up wit his name. Andi and Kul were the other options, but
It's a wolf... No it's a man .... No... It's Zincha 
