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St. Lucia - Canada Game Thread (R)


Lord Bob

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No it didn't. At least, not with any players that mattered. All the players that have left Canada that could have made a difference (**********, Begovic, JDG2 etc.) had no desire to play for Canada or jumped at the first chance at selling their soul for glory. There is very little we can do to stop that. You can rail against the CSA or whatever authority you want, but the fact is that for those players there's nothing you can do from preventing them from selling out. So, if Morgan (well, not him anymore now that he's capped) or Di Chiara had any inclination to play elsewhere, they wouldn't have accepted the call. Anytime you come into a team, you have to earn your playing time.

El Hombre has nailed it and this needs to be emphasized. The only "defector" that the Men's team has had the opportunity to cap has been Begovic and at the time that he turned out to an official MNT match he was cap-tied by the rules as they stood at the time. All the others have never even turned out for the MNT. We have never lost a player due to not playing them when they were with the MNT.

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Of course, Jake the Snake betrayed us on his way to a full national team game; Hart never had a chance to play him but he did try.

Just because a player hasn't betrayed us yet after failing to get into an official match, though, doesn't mean it couldn't happen.

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You play your most deserving players, that's the way you earn respect from your players.

Unlike us, our MNT coaching staff shouldn't be living in a constant state of paranoia regarding players allegiance.

If SH felt that Dunfield was the best central mid on the bench today when Johnson injury occured, he was right to sub him in.

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You play your most deserving players, that's the way you earn respect from your players.

Unlike us, our MNT coaching staff shouldn't be living in a constant state of paranoia regarding players allegiance.

If SH felt that Dunfield was the best central mid on the bench today when Johnson injury occured, he was right to sub him in.

How many times people posted this kind of philosophy on the boards. However, when the player chooses to play for another nation, it ends up always being the fault of the scouting staff or the coach's.

I like the idea of charging a amount of money to a player who was part of the program and then chose another nation. Maybe the CSA should make sign a contract to every player who is part of the NT, regardless the level. This may help the program a litlle, IMO. Unless that happens, let's not forget we are Canada and here the players are bigger than the program itself.

Also, as I said it before, to earn it =/= to cap-tie. We should start to see football/soccer from another perspective now, specially the Canadian perspective. It seems we never learn from our mistakes.

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Was busy most of the night but managed to catch the first goal (Jackson chip) on the radio feed and saw we were ahead 4-0 at HT. 7-0 is a good scoreline, shows the concentration work they were doing in training this week paid off. Good to see Jackson (or anyone for that matter) score 3 goals in one game, should help the confidence...

BTW, PR and SKN drew again - this time 1-1. Means the first match against SKN will actually mean something (assuming they beat St. Lucia at home and have 8 pts to our 12).

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I just had open internet (in Europe right now) and see 7:0, what the f**k? Made myself coffee and I'm reading all your opinions and views about the game with big smile on my face. That's the way to start Saturday!!!!

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http://www.sportsnet.ca/soccer/2011/10/07/dobson_canada_stlucia/

dobson_square_36.jpg

Gerry Dobson | October 7, 2011, 9:30 pm

This was a performance many people were expecting last month in Toronto. And it was a record breaker. Canada's 7-0 thumping of tiny St. Lucia was just what the doctor ordered.

The stadium wasn't ideal, after all it is a cricket facility and the pitch wasn't ideal for the same reason. There was concern about oppressive heat and humidity, but it wasn't an issue. Once the sun went down and the breeze kept moving, conditions were quite comfortable.

As for the match, it didn't start the way the first game did in Toronto. Remember how Canada overwhelmed the St. Lucians in the opening minutes making it look like it would be a walkover? That didn't happen on this night. Instead the visitors just slowly gathered momentum through solid movement on the ball in attack by De Rosario, Occean and Hume. Occean was especially lively and looks like a solid option up front going forward.

Some of the goals were well played, some were scrambly affairs, and others were gifts. Kenny Stamatopoulos didn't have a lot to do in goal, but he was sharp, made everything look easy, and even bailed out his defenders on one occasion.

Defending was fine. Maybe not perfect, but remember, it was patchwork with all the injured players unavailable.

Play through the midfield was fine, but it was the work of the attacking players that impressed me. And impressed Stephen Hart as well. It will be interesting to see how he sets up his roster for the Puerto Rico match Tuesday night at BMO Field. And yes, we will be televising that one live, soccer fans.

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"Remember how Canada overwhelmed the St. Lucians in the opening minutes making it look like it would be a walkover? That didn't happen on this night. Instead the visitors just slowly gathered momentum through solid movement on the ball in attack by De Rosario, Occean and Hume."

This is what Hart mentioned after the first match. He thought his team was trying destroy St. Lucia from the opening kickoff with everyone in a frantic race to get on the scoresheet. Then when things didn't go all their way they had a difficult time responding. What he had hoped to see was patient build-up, with his team just confidently playing the kind of linking soccer they are trying to play, and dominating via a solid 90 minutes. Sounds like they played this second match his way.

This group, despite roster changes, is by all accounts growing steadily more comfortable with each other, and it seems they just went out and played their game and the goals came. I think if there is a lesson for the team to take from this round its that. Lots of goals is nice, but going into Round 2 they need to be able to impose their will and their own style on the game, not play into the hands of the Hondurans and Panamanians, not freak out on the refs, not panic under pressure.

I don't know about Hart long-term as coach but if he can instill this kind of confident, patient approach in his players going forward he'll be doing just fine.

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