WWC 2015 - Quarter-final - June 27 - Canada vs. England [R]

[mtlfan]

I am just stunned that Tancredi thinks she is going to play at the Olympics:

 

http://soccer.tsn.ca/video/tancredi-devastating-loss-and-her-future/

 

If Herdman selects her, I will give up on this team.Seriously, does she think she can still make a difference after her horrible world cup?

 

I'm with you.

[Ruud]

Enjoyed Cathal Kelly's article in the Globe today.  Also the DeVos article.  No one is kidding themselves about the team or the coach or the pipeline.  Same as the men, more or less.  We are falling behind many other countries, and it is highly unlikely that the women will ever reach the quarterfinals ever again.

 

In a few years, Mexico, Colombia and Holland will pass Canada in rankings, as France and England have now done.  So it goes  - we'll always have hockey!  As DeVos writes, we need a real shift in the structure of our sport.  As a coach for several years and someone who still watches some youth soccer, we need to drop the focus on running and kicking at that age, with those who run fastest and kick the furthest getting the most attention.  The parents on the sidelines in our countries really is laughable.

 

By the time we figure it out, we'll be behind 50 other teams.  

 

I have nothing but praise for these girls, who did all they could within the confines of a really poor development system.  

[Ruud]

Oh so true about scouting.  I have concluded that Herdman doesn't know how to do any of that, nor does he have the skills himself to teach them.

 

Herdman did the best he could under the circumstances, which was mostly as a motivational speaker.  The lack of one-touch passes, controlled play, switches in direction, holds on the ball, etc of our team suggested that he added nothing to the girls' overall skill level (not really his job), although he surely did much better in helping with tactics, awareness and conditioning.  

 

You can pay any coach to do the same for less money.  Again, the real focus in on development at younger levels.  And to learn from the best countries.

[fishman]

Said it before, the talent is there Herdman needs to go looking for diamonds to cut and polish, instead of stirring smaller and smaller embers of the Edmonton U19s.

 

The quality of our technique has not improved much from the 2002 U19s. 13 years on, we remain static, while so many other countries pass us by.

 

Japan, in our Pool in 2002, gained 4 points and sat at -3 in goal differential. Canada beat them 4-nil in the group stage. Within 10 years (2012), Canada was knocked out of the U20 tournament in Japan, while Japan went on to win Bronze. At the senior level, Canada crashed out in last place in 2011, while Japan won that competition.

 

Until we develop a culture of football in Canada, including parental education and improved developmental opportunities, we will continue to churn our players who can run about and work hard, but who lack skill-on-demand and tactical awareness.

[Unnamed Trialist]

I was wrong. 

 

There, I said it.

[king1010]

How in gods green earth do you know the pipeline is not as strong?

If the CSA staff would get out and watch players all across the country from u15 and above they would the pipeline full of technical players and players with world class speed...the truth is Herdman et al do not go see new players, he has no published pln of what he wants, no metrics no nothing but his brain laboratory, as if he is using some Wilder Penfield rub goldbrick machine from 1960.

Said it before, the talent is there Herdman needs to go looking for diamonds to cut and polish, instead of stirring smaller and smaller embers of the Edmonton U19s.

As others have mentioned. Our development has stagnated and other countries in the world have passed us. This is no secret and we have been talking about it for the last couple of years. There arent players in the development system ready to step in to replace the old guard of 2002 u19 players. We've rested on our success and the world has caught up to us.

I find it difficult to believe that you know all the "world class" players in canada over the age of 15 that would make us a world powerhouse, but somehow the csa and every national team coach in canada dont see them.

The talent simply isnt there. There were young fresh players on the bench this tournament. They werent world class though, and neither are these mythical players you claim we have just hanging around in canada with "world class speed and technical abilities"

And even if they were world class u15 and above, 16 and 17 year olds werent going to win us the world cup. We have a hole in talent from the ages of 20 to 28 as growth has stagnated.

[Trillium]

As others have mentioned. Our development has stagnated and other countries in the world have passed us. This is no secret and we have been talking about it for the last couple of years. There arent players in the development system ready to step in to replace the old guard of 2002 u19 players. We've rested on our success and the world has caught up to us.

I find it difficult to believe that you know all the "world class" players in canada over the age of 15 that would make us a world powerhouse, but somehow the csa and every national team coach in canada dont see them.

The talent simply isnt there. There were young fresh players on the bench this tournament. They werent world class though, and neither are these mythical players you claim we have just hanging around in canada with "world class speed and technical abilities"

And even if they were world class u15 and above, 16 and 17 year olds werent going to win us the world cup. We have a hole in talent from the ages of 20 to 28 as growth has stagnated.

I did not say I knew where or who the world class players are, but I do know lots of talent resides outside the CSA talent pool. Until you can show me Herdman and his staff are out looking for players of potential at all levels of the game, and not finding them I will consider you an apologist for the less then acceptable result.

PM me tell me where you live, then I can suggest some leagues and teams to go see yourself, then after you see the talent, tell me if after 20 or 30 games in your region, did you not see one or two players of developmental potential.

Cause that is Herdmans job, organize a way to view hundreds of games,have criteria that are objective and measurable for players...watch and select. Then train, make skilled technical players fitter and stronger, teach tactical awareness, yes teach how to decide to execute a professional foul. If you need a six foot something Central defender put a call out to all the female coaches he must have in his coaches database, send out weekly emails telling all those coaches what he is looking for.

Make it clear to all the players the current team claims to have inspired, that he John Herdman is seeking them out and wants to find the best of them.

King1010, drop a note to Herdman or the team manager, ask how you can help identify players for his player pool.

[rkomar]

I remember after the Olympics that Herdman said we were never going to be favourites to win the World Cup, and that hosting it was more about inspiring young women to strive for being part of future national teams.  Well, I think that plan is going to hell right now.  The shitstorm and hate being directed at the current players is going to make the young have a good long think about whether it's worth the bother.

[king1010]

Its not the national teams maanagers job to go scout local u16 girls oysl games or srsl games. And definatrly not his job to go watch hundreds of youth league games to scout the talent. Thats for the provincial coaches and people down the pipeline.

And as good as you think some of these players are, other countries are developing better players. The talent isnt there. We've been left behind and the future results will show that.

I live in Hamilton and i have watched the hamilton lady avalanche/ hamilton rage as well as mcmaster university. And let me tell you there is no hidden talent that we could develop to world class players. I know personaly girls who have gone on scholarship in the states to D1 schools and they are nowhere near the talent level of the canWNT.

Please let me know where these hidden leagues are in southern ontario where players are ready to be groomed to win the world cup.

And im not being an apologist. We're up shits creek. We're f*cked. We have sat on our golden generation of talent thinking we've made it to the world stage. Numerous soccer columnists in Canada have been saying this the past year. Time to get down to the grassroots level and start producing the talent we did 10 years ago.

Another issue is these girls have no place to play or develop. Many of the W league teams in Canada have folded.

[Cheeta]

Apparently Sesselmann is taking a beating on Twitter where all the gutless little boys are insulting her.  Where's Shauna Hunt when you need her?  Send some of the abusive comments to their employers..

 

And who's surprised?  Shit hawks squaking on the internet is not a novel concept.  At her age she should know what's fair is fair and what's shit is shit, take her lumps and carry on.  But Geezus, don't react to it FFS.  I know it's easier said than done but fu'k me, YES, you went from bad to worse, YES, you are quite rightly going to get beat up black and blue over it but take a big breath, accept it for what it is and move on without feeding the trolls and without giving yourself a tumor.

 

Bit ironic she was having a decent opening 10 minutes before falling apart.  But you just knew her confidense was hanging by a thread by the way her team mates reacted after that fall.  Guessing some of the criticisms from the earlier matches had already taken its toll.

 

I understand the criticisms being thrown about but I'm taking more positives from this tourney than some others here.  Don't get me wrong, there are players and strategies that I'm going to pillary but I though the ladies did better than alright.  I include Sinclair, McLeod and especially Schmidt in that assessment. 

 

Still, boy England look there for the taking on Saturday.  Damn.

[Vic]

Bit of a length to this, apologies too tired to boil it down.  Bear with me.

 

Two quick detours.

 

First: perspective.  I sat there in the stadium and watched England beat a strong Norwegian side that tied Germany (and beat them in the last Euro).  Norway weren't even in the game in the second half.  England also beat a good Colombian team and their only loss was by a single goal to France, who can play a bit.

 

England have a two-tier high-performance league with relegation/promotion, club contracts for hundreds of players, St. George's Park and the vast resources of the English FA to leverage.

 

We lost a semi-final berth to the #6 ranked team in the world, by a goal.

 

Second: history.  Let's go back a step.  

 

Around the turn of the century Canadian women's soccer was grit.  We played something like Iceland do although not as psychotic.  We tackled tough and challenged for balls like banshees.  Other countries hated playing us because they knew we played like hockey.

 

Queue Even Pellerud.  We transformed to direct.  We still played with grit and defended with more organization and tried to catch teams on the counter.

 

Next, Carolina Morace.  She tried to achieve better results from a more possession-based approach.

 

And finally, John Herdman.  He went after a new DNA: transitional efficiency, physicality and control.

 

All great ideas, some better than others but none inherently flawed to the point of being wrong per se.

 

We look around the world and we see many different types of play.  The lithe effortless movement of the Japanese, the mad ball skills of Brazil and Colombia, the  clinical play of the Germans and French in every aspect, the athleticism of the Africans, the direct attacking of Norway, etc.

 

We're somewhere in the middle of it all, trying to patch together something with the limited resources we have on and off the field to compete with bred-in-the-bone footballing nations many times our size, culture and resources.  You couldn't find a better definition of alchemy.

 

I read Jason de Vos article and while I agree with grassroots and LTPD I'm not sure that's the real problem.  Like I said, I've seen girls 12-13 in over half the top 15 countries in the world and we're not much different.  The difference is after that.

 

dsqpr, you asked me a page back why I dont think there's respect for women's football in Canada.  There's an enormous amount of respect for the national team in Canada.  But after that top 20 players, what do we have to offer girls and women who want to take the game seriously?

 

How many programs are there in Canada for adult women that train more than twice a week?

 

Think of the countries we are saying we are crap because we're not like them.  If you are a talented mid-to-late teenager in these countries you are recruited by a club team that trains all week in a program that runs all year.  You sign a contract and learn from national and ex-national women (and a good chance with foreign players they've brought in).  You will play weekly highly competitive games where results matter.

 

What you won't do, is get shunted into a provincial or NTC program like we've done for decades and yet we keep thinking we can do it better and everyone else in the world is wrong.  Monopolies are great for business, but they're sh*t for efficiency and results.  

 

These countries we're losing to and falling behind on.  How many of these countries sole-source their best youth players to national training programs?  I think you know the answer.

 

How many programs are there in Canada for adult women that train more than twice a week?  I know I said that above, it's not a typo.

 

We found the alchemist who turned base metal into precious metal.  Maybe not water into wine this time.  But regardless, even if he did, is a medal in a tournament more valuable than developing the women's game and taking it past the same club infrastructure options that existed in 1980?

 

We have been trying to improve/define the process for environmentalizing 20 women to win a World Cup for a long, long time.  I'm not so sure the better approach to results isn't just trying to find a way to create opportunities to let women do it themselves.

[Lord Bob]

Dead last in 2011.

Sixth in 2015.

WE'RE FALLING BEHIND SO QUICKLY

[king1010]

Dead last in 2011.

Sixth in 2015.

WE'RE FALLING BEHIND SO QUICKLY

You gotta dig a little deeper than that. Compare who we played in 2011 Germany, France and Nigeria. Good chance we would have lost to all 3 again this tournament with the way we played. And Nigeria had one of the youngest team in the tournament with an average age of 23.59.

 

And compare how many of the exact same players on our roster in 2011 vs 2015.

 

We were set up for success this tournament. FIFA wanted us to go far for attendance and revenue purposes. You can't compare 16th to 6th. The first tough opponent we played we couldn't beat.

 

Also the average age of this team was over 28, one of the oldest in the tournament.

[Lord Bob]

Did you watch the 2011 World Cup? We got killed every game. Every. Game. Even by Nigeria, who were shit. This time around we were undefeated in the group then outplayed England for most of the game but lost due to a blunder. It happens.

[king1010]

Did you watch the 2011 World Cup? We got killed every game. Every. Game. Even by Nigeria, who were shit. This time around we were undefeated in the group then outplayed England for most of the game but lost due to a blunder. It happens.

 

I know and im saying our average age is old by womens soccer standards. And we used almost exclusively the same players that got killed in 2011 because we didn't have young up and comers who were good enough to replace them. Girls like Tancredi and Sesselman (who was recruited from the States because we weren't developing enough talent) were weak links.

 

Had we played France and Germany we again would have been killed like in 2011. And the players we did play with this tournament, many wont be around in 2019. As of right now we don't have the players to step in and fill that void being left by the Sinclairs, Tancredis, Mathesons, Wilkinsons etc.

[Lord Bob]

I agree that many of our better players are old, and that's a pity. But our MVP, Buchanan, is a kid. Our most consistent attacking threat, Lawrence, is a kid. Scott, Schmidt, Belanger, and Chapman, among our better players, have a World Cup left in their primes. Of the quality players from these games only Sinclair is over 30, and there's no replacing her.

I fully agree we have problems, and we need to improve our scouting and our youth coaching, and the team wasn't as good as it could have been, and mistakes were made. I just can't get into the "this was a disaster" or "we're so screwed" mindsets.

[-Hammer-]

I am just stunned that Tancredi thinks she is going to play at the Olympics:

 

http://soccer.tsn.ca/video/tancredi-devastating-loss-and-her-future/

 

If Herdman selects her, I will give up on this team.Seriously, does she think she can still make a difference after her horrible world cup?

 

Alright...well lets be constructive about it then. Who do you feel should replace her?

[king1010]

I agree that many of our better players are old, and that's a pity. But our MVP, Buchanan, is a kid. Our most consistent attacking threat, Lawrence, is a kid. Scott, Schmidt, Belanger, and Chapman, among our better players, have a World Cup left in their primes. Of the quality players from these games only Sinclair is over 30, and there's no replacing her.

I fully agree we have problems, and we need to improve our scouting and our youth coaching, and the team wasn't as good as it could have been, and mistakes were made. I just can't get into the "this was a disaster" or "we're so screwed" mindsets.

 

Fair point. I can respect that opinion. Perhaps it isn't a disaster. But the future isn't the brightest its ever been either. And other countries are improving at a fast pace.

[king1010]

Alright...well lets be constructive about it then. Who do you feel should replace her?

 

Leon or Filigno are my picks.

[Sport Shaman]

^^^ Hopefully you're not serious about Filigno. She had a brief time where she could come on as a sub and bring some energy or maybe a late scoring chance. That hasn't been the case for a while and she has shown that when she starts there isn't enough stamina there to be effective for more than a half, let alone the full game. She is small, gets pushed off the ball and isn't going to do anything in the air. Not only that she runs a lot to chase the play, mostly without the ball, and doesn't have a great touch when she does end up with the ball. In other words, a smaller less durable Kaylyn Kyle without the defensive upside.

 

I think that Leon has far more potential but there is a ways to go before she would be starting every game. After that I would be looking at some of the players from last years U20 squad that have not yet broken into the senior team. There have to be some spots opening up as a few of the senior players retire either before or after the Olympic run.  

[king1010]

Of course I was serious about her. I didn't post her name as a joke. It just further emphasizes the lack of attacking player development we've had the past couple of years.

 

I agree with everything you said about her, I still think that in a years time she would offer more than a 35 year old tancredi who is pre occupied with becoming a chiropractor rather than playing soccer (nothing wrong with that).

 

Id hope someone from the U20 team could step up in front of Foligino too.

[Sport Shaman]

It's kind of a no win scenario when we have to debate the merits of Tancredi vs Filigno.

 

On the one hand we have Tancredi, who peaked in 2012 and hasn't regained her form since, that was an extremely valuable asset but has depreciated over time to the point where she should probably retire now with her best days behind her.

 

Then on the other hand we have Filigno, who never reached the value of a Tancredi in her prime in spite of some flashes of potential, and is an asset that never really matured enough to take away a starting position.

 

Rather than transition from used to be to never quite was, I think it would be helpful to skip that step and move on to someone who might be the future.

 

We should all be grateful for everything the current roster has done for us up to this point and thank them for their contributions. But honestly, if you were king for the day, wouldn't now be the time to retire some veterans and move ahead with a reset for the team. I do not see the point in using the Olympics as a farewell tour for a number of players just hanging on to their spot because the next generation wasn't quite ready yet.     

[paul-collins]

 

Think of the countries we are saying we are crap because we're not like them.  If you are a talented mid-to-late teenager in these countries you are recruited by a club team that trains all week in a program that runs all year.  You sign a contract and learn from national and ex-national women (and a good chance with foreign players they've brought in).  You will play weekly highly competitive games where results matter.

 

What you won't do, is get shunted into a provincial or NTC program like we've done for decades and yet we keep thinking we can do it better and everyone else in the world is wrong.  Monopolies are great for business, but they're sh*t for efficiency and results.  

 

These countries we're losing to and falling behind on.  How many of these countries sole-source their best youth players to national training programs?  I think you know the answer.

 

How many programs are there in Canada for adult women that train more than twice a week?  I know I said that above, it's not a typo.

 

Nevermind the adult programs, we can't even keep our provincial programs running properly.

 

http://www.ontariosoccer.net/player/talented-pathway/rex

[ThruBall]

Neither Leon’s nor Filigno's record in recent NWSL play is of any distinction. However they at least have a record, something that Tancredi's doesn't have over the same period.

 

If Herdman is now that singular voice for soccer in Canada, he needs to pay attention to the soccer public and at least try and field a competitive team. 

·         It's not acceptable to bring a roster to the WC or the Olympics that consists of players he cannot or will not be playing.

·         If you can't sit a player because of match performance and replace them with another, then what are you really shooting for?

·         Team selection is a reflection of the coaches bundle of skills, experience and assessment of what it will take to win; team membership shouldn't be a players right.

 

From a fan's perspective, we want to see the best players and believe in our nation; it goes without saying that the athlete works hard at their sport and possesses unique abilities that separates them from others who work as hard or harder. The tournament win IS the goal, inspiration and next generation participation is a bi-product; not a WIN.

 

Intellectual soccer sense, skill and athleticism are the core ingredients to soccer talent. There are many soccer specific programs in operation across Canada today, outside of the “national team official pipeline” that are building soccer talent on both the men’s and women’s side of the game. Both C. Larin (MLS 1^st round pick 2015) and A. Chapman (LB-WNT) are youth products of Club/Academy Soccer, programs not officially apart of the “National Team” pipeline.

 

Herdman appears more interested in the publicity that his position affords him than the results of what his program delivers.

 

When I see open tryouts for the National Woman's Team on a programmatic, and consistent basis, conducted across Canada as part of the "national pipeline program", I'll know Herdman is starting to put his shoulder to the boulders that are exerting the dead weight on the national soccer program in this country.

 

We don't have a professional league on our soil and likely won't for some time to come. 

 

If it ain't broke, don't fix it!

 

It's broke; isn't it?

[Trillium]

 

 

 

When I see open tryouts for the National Woman's Team on a programmatic, and consistent basis, conducted across Canada as part of the "national pipeline program", I'll know Herdman is starting to put his shoulder to the boulders that are exerting the dead weight on the national soccer program in this country.

 

 

If you do not have white hair yet... you will waiting for that, quite frankly Herdman is not willing to do the hard work, and despite King1010 statements about there being no talent, I agree with you there is talent and it can be found with a proper systemic progam, that is not a skill set in the CSA techical departments background or competence.