The Canadian Men's Soccer Team Thread

[Matty81]

Caps have been doing a good job developing kids for junior national teams for a long time so I don't really think this figures in to the whole "Caps hate Canada" dramatics that have been going on.

People slag them off because the perception is that they never give Canadian kids a chance in their senior team. This is an old argument, some saying that players will never improve to a senior team level without getting at least a few games under their belts and others saying the players need to be good senior level players before the team will play them.

I think both sides make good points, the decent Caps guys who have been cut loose have mostly ended up as 2nd-4th tier players in europe, so no world beaters. That said they have also employed a ton of journeymen americans as bench players who you could argue guys like Edwini-Bonsu, Clarke, Straith, Alderson, Thomas etc were as good as - and I think their history of releasing so many young Canadians without a shot at 1st team minutes would be better accepted as wise if they had won some trophies or been getting good results.

From my perspective, it is a bit troubling how they hoover up so much of the best young Canadian talent and so few of them graduate to the first team. I don't know if that's more of an indictment of our talent level as a country or their development and decision making. They definitely attract more of our top young players than TFC or Montreal - taking Alderson, an Ontario player and u-17 Canadian of the year right out from under TFC's nose a few years ago was pretty reflective of the pull they have with Canadian youth players.

[MillerTime GFG]

Cool - Chris Serban played on my team with Villains for a couple seasons (a couple years ago). Good kid, great to see him getting some recognition.

He never had the greatest touch, and I'll bet he still doesn't, but he was a good finisher and worked hard to get to those areas. Deceivingly fast, and doesn't get pushed off the ball easily like most young kids do vs. men. In fact, he would out-muscle guys much bigger and older than him to get scoring chances.

I never knew he was in the Canadian system, I think it must be a newer thing. I believe he played a season or two in Germany recently, and came back a much better player.

[shermanator]

The whole "Caps hate Canada" argument began before 2011 as the Whitecaps lobbied MLS to reduce the number of Canadians required on the roster to 3. They wiped the roster of Canadian talent, and fielded Teibert, a couple journeymen, and a youth player that was nowhere near the 18 as their 3 domestics. The following year the Whitecaps gave only 134 minutes to Canadians for the whole year. Essentially the Whitecaps went from producing a large amount of talent for the national team, to scrubbing their first team of all minutes.

There is a gentleman out in the blogging world that tracks Canadian minutes on Canadian pro teams for each year, and the numbers are here.

http://oot-football.blogspot.ca/2011...eam-in-11.html
http://oot-football.blogspot.ca/2012...inal-data.html

Personally, I think the whole "Caps hate Canada" thing is a bit of a meme amongst more level headed supporters, but the viewpoint is there for a reason. I don't have numbers to back it up, but I've read that the Whitecaps give the least first team minutes to domestics of any professional soccer team in the world.

It's a perception that should improve with Adekugbe, Froese, Carducci and Bustos breaking into the first team over the next few years, but it'll be around for a bit more. IMO, none of the 5 Canadian pro teams give enough minutes to Canadian talent.

[Addick]

Didn't the Whitecaps start pumping massive money into the Residency program before MLSE even purchased an MLS franchise?

Even though player development is a wise investment, it is not a guarantee of consistent returns. Arsenal's Hale End Academy is one of the envies in England yet it's having quite the barren run.

[Johnny199r]

What was missing for the Caps and every other mls team, was a pyramid for development. It doesn't matter how many great 18 year olds you have if you cant get them playing time in order to develop because the coach will get fired if the first team doesn't win.

That all changes this year with USL PRO. I'd go so far to argue that without a proper pyramid, based on development results, MLS teams were throwing money away by having academies.

[shermanator]

I agree, johnny199r, the establishment of the 3 USL Pro teams is a key place for the players who are too good for the academy but not quite ready for MLS. Hopefully Calgary Foothills can fit in on that development pyramid somewhere as well.

[Matty81]

Canada beat Haiti 3-1 to open the U-20 world cup qualifying tournament today. Michael Petrasso of QPR with a goal and Jordan Hamilton of TFC with the other 2.

Toughest group game coming up on Monday v Mexico. Mexico beat Cuba 9-1 today!

[shermanator]

Watched the game vs Haiti via streaming. Canada pretty much dominated the play, and the Haitian goal was a bobbled free kick by Carducci that he should have played better. The refereeing was atrocious as usual, there were a few penalties against the Haitians that could have been called, including what IMO was a straight red to the keeper when he took out Jordan Hamilton in the second half. Guess the youngins are getting a taste of CONCACAF refereeing early on.

As a sidenote, Jordan Hamilton is the best finisher I have ever seen at any level of Canadian soccer. I haven't been watching Canada for a super long time, but I can say that with 100% conviction. Every opportunity he gets seems to go in the back of the net.

[Jimmy Stang]

^ Was the stream on the Concacaf site, or was it... ahem... unofficial? I wouldn't mind tuning in tomorrow afternoon for the Mexico match.

[Johnny199r]

Unofficial stream.

[Matty81]

Two big developments in the next world cup qualifying cycle:

This came out showing that Canada has a pretty easy road to road 4, avoiding Jamaica, Haiti and all of the pot "E" teams...
http://gff.gy/wp-content/uploads/201...4.41.00-PM.png

And the actual draw was made for round 2 - Canada draws British Virgin Islands or Dominica.
http://www.wakingthered.com/2015/1/1...-national-team

If the away game was in February I might be tempted to take a road trip. Good set up for Canada. Now when the next draw comes in if we can just draw a round 4 group with Aruba and Trinidad to go along with Mexico/US/Costa Rica... perfect.

[shermanator]

The U-20 team just lost 2-1 to Cuba and are essentially done in their World Cup qualification cycle. Just beyond a disappointing result for a team that was supposedly brimming with talent, and had expectations of qualifying for the World Cup.

[Jimmy Stang]

It is important to note that Cuba also lost 9-1 to Mexico, and tied Haiti (the group's punching bag). This is a very, very, very disappointing result. Both the match and the entire qualifying campaign. Wow.

[Matty81]

Yeah that's a horrible result. The el salvador loss was bad, but Cuba is terrible. Disappointing but if you don't beat those teams, you don't deserve to qualify.

Well bring on Dominica\British Virgin Islands. We can beat them!.... Right?

[shermanator]

Well, on the bright side, our randomly glued together senior team drew Iceland 1-1. Iceland also had a randomly glued together team as well.

[Addick]

Look who's back!

Ian Hume: Tranmere Rovers Bring Back Striker On Six-Month Deal

29 January 2015
BBC Sport

Tranmere Rovers have re-signed striker Iain Hume on a six-month contract.

The 31-year-old came through the youth system at Tranmere and made 176 appearances, scoring 37 goals.

The Canada international had been playing in the Indian Super League at Kerala Blasters, where ex-England keeper David James is head coach.

"I'm delighted Iain has agreed to join us, said boss Micky Adams. "He had a number of options but his passion for Tranmere was clear to see."

Complete Story

[Locke]

Yeah Tranmere!

[shermanator]

Hope he pulls them out of the relegation battle in League Two. Been a rough few years for Tranmere.

[polak]

Originally Posted by shermanator

Well, on the bright side, our randomly glued together senior team drew Iceland 1-1. Iceland also had a randomly glued together team as well.

It saddens me that drawing a country with a population of 300,000 people is a decent result for us...

It's like our national team tied the best players from Omaha.

[Bill Bumface]

The CMNT quietly fires off a couple wins over the international break.

1-0 over Guatemala and 3-0 over Puerto Rico.

I cannot remember the last time they had 2 wins in a row, let alone clean sheets. I wish these were shown on TV.