Wow - Thunder Dan

An Observer · October 31, 2006

Its amazing how some people on the board just ignore the facts of the situation.

Fernandes played a number of games as a youth for Canada and was seemingly committed to the program at that time. It seems from some comments that perhaps Portugal was interested in the guy at the time.

November 2002 - It seems that during the lead up to the WCQ for the U-20 side (the first possibility of Canada capping him), he had a fall out with Mitchell and Mitchel decided to play Karim instead. Fernandes road the pine including the last game against the U.S. that Canada needed a result to qualify. We indeed got that result and won the group. Up until November 2002, its safe to say that Fernandes was number one on that U-20 side although Karim and Simon Rayner did get some playing time as well as Wagenaar and Lindley when others were not avaialbe (although the latter 2 were underaged). And as Jeffrey S. has admitted years ago on this website, Ferandes admitted to him that he was (at least partly) at fault for the situation that developed with Mitchel and put it down to his over eagerness of his youth.

Between November 2002 and November 2003 - The Youth WC 2003 was postponed due to the war in Iraq. It seems that Mitchel had told Fernades that he would be included on the roster for the spring WC. Jeffrey claims to have the roster (although I don't believe he has ever produced it here). Assuming correct, Mitchel decided sometime before the rescheduled event in the autumn to exclude Ferandes (and Rayner for that matter) from the final squad and replace them with Wagenaar and Lindley (two underaged keepers). Jeffrey claims that Ferandes wanted to play for Canada at that time. I can only speculate that Mitchel decided to go with the young inexperienced keepers in relation to the immature attitude displayed by Fernandes the year before. Of course, Jeffrey will jump into defend him here but I think the consenus on the forum is that Fernandes displayed a questionable attitude in November. So was Mitchel justified in excluding him? I agree with those that say yes. Its a coaches decision and if he made the decision based on kid's attitude at the time, I support it whether he was playing for Celtic Vigo at the time or Man United. Does it support Ferandes going to another country? Perhaps, but if he freely admits that he was part of the problem, I question that.

November 2003 to November 2005 - Canada had failed to qualify for the Olympics shortly after the World Youth Cup so there was no opportunity for Fernandes to move up to the U-23 side to be capped in the summer 2004. Moreover, Ferandes was dropped by Celtic Vigo and then by Regensburg in the German third division. He certainly was not national team material during the early to mid 2004 being without a team and never actually having played a professional match. Some time in late 2004, he signed with PAOK. For essentially the first year (2004-2005), he was used as a back up. Late in that season I believe, the manager was replaced. He gave Ferandes a try in some late matches in replacing the incumbent keeper.

During February 2005 and March 2005, we played Northern Ireland and Portugal respectively. With Fernades on the bench at PAOK and having virtually no professional experience, it seems unlikely that he would warrant a call for the national side at that time. After a few starts during the end of the year for PAOK, he was not called for the Gold Cup in the summer of 2005. This also seems a prudent choice considering his lack of professional experience and the uncertainty of his position (he probably would have wanted to focus on winning his starting position at PAOK in any event ). I also doubt that during this period Portugal was extremely interested in him (but of course Jeffrey may say differently). After the summer of 2005, it seems he gained the starting position at PAOK where he seems to after an up and down start (by the accounts of the fans) to have excelled. We played a friendly early in September against Spain where Stamatopoulos started and played reasonably well. Our next friendly was mid-November 2005 against Luxembourg. Hirschfeld backed out at the last minute and was replaced by Begovic who was near by in Belgium. Stamatopoulos started that match probably based on his performance against Spain (of which on a side, I think was the reason Hirschfeld pulled out as was not starting), who had a number of years of pro experience under his belt albeit at generally lower levels. Its debatable whether Fernandes should have been called or not for this match. Stamatopoulos had played well in the past for Canada and Fernandes had only been a starting keeper for PAOK for max. 3 months. Personally, I probably would have liked to have seen him called for that match but he wasnt.

Our next match was in January 2006 against the US on a non-international date where no Europeans were called who were with their club sides. So to expect Fernandes to be called here is unreasonable (and in fact, could be viewed as a negative by him as others would have been given preferences to be allowed to stay). It then seems clear that he was contacted prior to the Austria match at the end of February but by then he was flirting with Portugal.

Therefore, in sum, it seems that Jeffrey and others blame the CSA and some of their coaches for 1. not capping Ferandes in the U-20 tournament (or its qualifying) where there seems to have been a conflict with the coach which was at least partly his fault (on his own admission); and 2. possibly excluding him from being called for one friendly where the one keeper called had started the previous match and played reasonably well and the other keeper was starting for Rosenburg and had a track record. Personally, I do not believe you can blame the CSA or Mitchel for that.

Jeffrey's claim is that he had been approached for years by Portugal so he is somehow justified in accepting their overtures. First of all, it seems that coaches should only pick sides on the basis of someone's potential and/or whether they can play for some other national side. I don't agree with that philosophy. Second, if Canada had an active U-23 side as European nations do, I think he would have been approached by Canada probably even as early as 2004. That was not the case (and its worth noting that Portugal to my knowledge has not approached him for their senior side). Third, Fernades was snubbed once at best and then went over to Portugal. Fourth, it was not a 6 year affair. He played for Canada up to November 2002. After November 2003, he was not really a candidate to play for us again until November 2005 when shortly he after he choose Portugal.

Therefore, at best, Canada is not responsible and Ferandes just sold himself to the highest bidder. At worse, Canada is not responsible and circumstances came to me (partly as Canada has no U-23 side unless qualifying for the Olympics and so few national team friendlies) that allowed Fernades to fly the coup (so that no one is at fault).

An Observer · October 31, 2006