General Discussion on CMNT

[Markoaleks]

Shout out to the person I saw today who had a Canada soccer car flag- nice to see it today in Burlington 

[One American]

The thing about recruiting Kadioglu is that the hardest thing for the next cycle will be retiring and replacing a number of players, particularly starters (Vittoria, Atiba, Hoilett, Osorio, Wotherspoon) and maybe replacing a few others who might be on the downside (Cav, MAK, Piette, Borjan). That's 9 of the probable top 25 players in the pool.  

Looking at the past couple of youth team rosters listed on Wiki ..... Bereft. Priso and Shaffelburg, maybe Choiniere. But are any of them all that good? Beyond that, a lot of dudes floating between CanPL and It also seems like over the course of the last year, the hype train on a number of prospects has started floating off the Port of Los Angeles. 

There are a number of potential replacement for each loss. But it's a lot more if than when. And the picture looks worse than a year ago. 

Unlike a lot of the prospects, Ferdi is actually doing well in a respectable league. You have to keep that in mind when considering options. 

 

Edited October 16, 2021 by One American

[trc2014]

4 minutes ago, One American said:

The thing about recruiting Kadioglu is that the hardest thing for the next cycle will be retiring and replacing a number of players, particularly starters (Vittoria, Atiba, Hoilett, Osorio, Wotherspoon) and maybe replacing a few others who might be on the downside (Cav, MAK, Piette, Borjan). That's 9 of the probable top 25 players in the pool.  

Looking at the past couple of youth team rosters ..... Bereft. Priso and Shaffelburg, maybe Choiniere. But are any of them all that good? Beyond that, a lot of dudes floating between CanPL and It also seems like over the course of the last year, the hype train on a number of prospects has started floating off the Port of Los Angeles. 

There are a number of potential replacement for each loss. But it's a lot more if than when. And the picture looks worse than a year ago. 

Unlike a lot of the prospects, Ferdi is actually doing well in a respectable league. You have to keep that in mind when considering options. 

 

Borjan has said he will retire in the next few years.  You don’t think Oso can play the next cycle?

[Stryker911]

Good to see that Larin, Borjan, and Hutchinson are all fit enough to play this weekend. Also great to see that we have the depth to play well without them. 

[johnyb]

3 hours ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

This would be hard on a player, but I think it happens pretty well for every team, every World Cup. There are always guys left off who feel hard done by.

Later injuries are also common (including very dumb ones--Cañizares then Valencia keeper was left of the Spain 2002 WC squad because a flask of cologne shattered in his hands in the shower and lacerated his hands.)

For example, if Atiba is injured, and not getting much minutes, and can't get minutes for Canada or his club team, and is even contemplating retirement this upcoming June, you may have to leave him off. Does Besiktas have to give him another year's contract if they don't think he can contribute on the pitch, just to help him get to Qatar? I am not sure about that, though they seem to love him and must might. 

Any of the guys not regularly starting could get left off, though our lack of depth at CB might save a Cornelius and see us lose a Wotherspoon or Fraser. Whatever Shaffelberg or Pasher do they are unlikely to go, if the rest of the attackers are fit--they have too little margin to show much more than they have. Then others not playing much, like Piette, would most likely go regardless of his upcoming season, since we don't have much cover like that in the defensive middle. 

If we make it, Atiba has to be there. If he doesn't have the quality to make the 23 come WC2022, then make him an Assistant or even a waterboy for all I care. We need him in the room and he's earned his spot. 

[dyslexic nam]

2 hours ago, One American said:

The thing about recruiting Kadioglu is that the hardest thing for the next cycle will be retiring and replacing a number of players, particularly starters (Vittoria, Atiba, Hoilett, Osorio, Wotherspoon) and maybe replacing a few others who might be on the downside (Cav, MAK, Piette, Borjan). That's 9 of the probable top 25 players in the pool.  

Looking at the past couple of youth team rosters listed on Wiki ..... Bereft. Priso and Shaffelburg, maybe Choiniere. But are any of them all that good? Beyond that, a lot of dudes floating between CanPL and It also seems like over the course of the last year, the hype train on a number of prospects has started floating off the Port of Los Angeles. 

There are a number of potential replacement for each loss. But it's a lot more if than when. And the picture looks worse than a year ago. 

Unlike a lot of the prospects, Ferdi is actually doing well in a respectable league. You have to keep that in mind when considering options. 

 

Kaye is 26 so still should have juice left for the next cycle.  Same goes for Sammy Piette.  The others you mentioned I tend to agree with.  

In terms of replacements I don’t think things are bleak at all.   In midfield, Priso is definitely on the right path.  His biggest negative is that he plays the same position as Staq.  But at 18 he was absolutely at home in MLS so I think his ceiling is high.   JMR, despite all the debate, only turned 17 a few months ago and should still mature into someone who can fit in and contribute at that level.  And I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Nelson (19) ended up developing into something like the playmaking midfielder we had previously expected.  Even Shaffelburg at 21 has shown enough recent progress that I think he could be a solid contributor.  Keep in mind that it took a while before guys like Oso and Laryea were ready for this level.

In defence we still have Cornelius (23) maturing (not sure if he is in your “top 25”) and from the sounds of things Halbouni (21) is making serious progress. Along with Johnston (23) and Kennedy (24), there is a solid core there - though we will still be a bit thin.  But given where we are now it doesn’t seem like we will be worse off.  

In attack, we are obviously fine.  Davies, David, and Akinola will all be around for 19 years.  If Ennin can continue showing well in the top Russian League he will likely join that pool sooner rather than later.   

And none of this takes into consideration the guys we haven’t heard of yet.  A few years ago, almost no one here knew about Johnston, David was just starting to make waves, and Davies was just a kid with a bunch of potential.   

None of this tries to dismiss the idea of recruiting a Ferdi, a Marcelo, or a Jebbison.  But if they choose not to join up with our exciting team, we will be just fine.  
 

Edited October 16, 2021 by dyslexic nam

[BearcatSA]

4 hours ago, dyslexic nam said:

I get that.  But if a big part of your mantra has been building a team mentality and focusing on cohesion, this has the potential to impact that a bit.  

Not for fringe players being included or dropped based on necessity and/or form.  

[Bison44]

5 hours ago, One American said:

 

There are a number of potential replacement for each loss. But it's a lot more if than when. And the picture looks worse than a year ago. 

What are you smoking??  Johnston (23) started his canada carer this year and you can pencil him in as RB for the next 2 cycles.  Buchanon (22) was just starting to take off last year come playoff time and now looks like he can be a starter for the next 2 cycles.  Thats just 2 guys that have become starters and they were almost not existent in our program a year ago.  Corbeanu made his first apperance this year.....same with Akinola (21)...all this happened in the last year, all can be a backbone of a team for the next 8 years, how can the picture look worse than a year ago??

[SthMelbRed]

2 hours ago, Bison44 said:

What are you smoking??  Johnston (23) started his canada carer this year and you can pencil him in as RB for the next 2 cycles.  Buchanon (22) was just starting to take off last year come playoff time and now looks like he can be a starter for the next 2 cycles.  Thats just 2 guys that have become starters and they were almost not existent in our program a year ago.  Corbeanu made his first apperance this year.....same with Akinola (21)...all this happened in the last year, all can be a backbone of a team for the next 8 years, how can the picture look worse than a year ago??

Stupid people naturally see stupid things. 🙄

[Sal333]

1 minute ago, SthMelbRed said:

Stupid people naturally see stupid things. 🙄

Maybe he is hoping that's the case. His name is One American after all.

[Kent]

Yeah, it's a fools errand to try to guess who will emerge in the next few years. Which players did we see coming 2+ years before their national team debut? Probably pretty much only the dual nationals that held out. I'm not going to go one by one through our recent squads to see where they all were a couple years before their national team debut, but there are definitely lots of examples, and I would guess the majority of them weren't the type of guys people were saying they would be with the team a couple years later.

[canuckgbp]

Look at all the quality that has emerged from the MLS draft that is now on this national team. And they are playing starting minutes. 

[Approve My Account Pls]

7 hours ago, dyslexic nam said:

replacing a number of players, particularly starters (Vittoria, Atiba, Hoilett, Osorio, Wotherspoon) and maybe replacing a few others who might be on the downside (Cav, MAK, Piette, Borjan).

Forget the fact that we have no clue what talent will emerge between now and 2026 - Cav, Oso, MAK are all young enough that they will be back next cycle unless better and younger talent surpasses them. Piette is barely in the squad this cycle and will be off just because of quality. Hoilett and Wotherspoon won't be incredibly old at 36 and 35, but I would hope that younger guys will have pushed them out of the picture by that point. Borjan's replacement is evident and, debatably, has already/will soon equal/surpass him. But he, Atiba, and Vitoria will be happily retired having outperformed the Americans in Qatar 2022.

So all in all, incredibly incorrect assessment

Edited October 17, 2021 by Approve My Account Pls

[dyslexic nam]

3 minutes ago, Approve My Account Pls said:

Forget the fact that we have no clue what talent will emerge between now and 2026 - Cav, Oso, MAK are all young enough that they will be back next cycle unless better and younger talent surpasses them. Piette is barely in the squad this cycle and will be off just because of quality. Hoilett and Wotherspoon won't be incredibly old at 36 and 35, but I would hope that younger guys will have pushed them out of the picture by that point. Borjan's replacement is evident and, debatably, has already/will soon equal/surpass him. But he, Atiba, and Vitoria will be happily retired having outperformed the Americans in Qatar 2022.

So all in all, incredibly incorrect assessment

Just FYI - that isn’t my text being quoted.  It is OA’s.  

[CanadaFan123]

10 hours ago, One American said:

The thing about recruiting Kadioglu is that the hardest thing for the next cycle will be retiring and replacing a number of players, particularly starters (Vittoria, Atiba, Hoilett, Osorio, Wotherspoon) and maybe replacing a few others who might be on the downside (Cav, MAK, Piette, Borjan). That's 9 of the probable top 25 players in the pool.  

Looking at the past couple of youth team rosters listed on Wiki ..... Bereft. Priso and Shaffelburg, maybe Choiniere. But are any of them all that good? Beyond that, a lot of dudes floating between CanPL and It also seems like over the course of the last year, the hype train on a number of prospects has started floating off the Port of Los Angeles. 

There are a number of potential replacement for each loss. But it's a lot more if than when. And the picture looks worse than a year ago. 

Unlike a lot of the prospects, Ferdi is actually doing well in a respectable league. You have to keep that in mind when considering options. 

 

Just look at the players who have emerged for us since last cycle in 2016. The next generation is even better. We are more than fine.

[Approve My Account Pls]

10 hours ago, dyslexic nam said:

Just FYI - that isn’t my text being quoted.  It is OA’s.  

Yeah sorry, not quite sure why it quoted it as yours

[RS]

21 hours ago, One American said:

There are a number of potential replacement for each loss. But it's a lot more if than when. And the picture looks worse than a year ago. 

Completely asinine statement. A year ago Buchanan and Johnston weren't even in the national team picture, now they're two of the first names on Herdman's team sheet.

With more players in MLS, plus CPL continuing to grow, the player pool is getting deeper by the year. Not the opposite, which you are implying.

[baulderdash77]

2 years ago we looked desperate for defenders.

Suddenly Laryea and Johnston emerged and our FB position looks set.

Kennedy, Miller and Cornelius emerge/solidify and we are fine at CB as well.

The system infrastructure that has been set up with L1O, PQSL and the CanPL has basically created an expanded funnel that will keep turning up talent.  Not to mention the fact that it has established a domestic  talent floor for the Men’s program.  
 

8-10 years ago if anyone was drafted in the MLS we were immediately giving them caps and starts. We were regularly starting players in the 3rd divisions of European league setups and multiple players that had no club setup at all.  Those days are long gone now and aside from the rare case where a star player is in between contracts that is pretty much never going to happen again.

The program has progressed to the point that we expect away wins against everyone but the US and Mexico and we are disappointed by away draws.  We expect to get a result at home against the US and Mexico.  We are playing for away points against those teams, not just trying to get blown away.

Canada’s program has transformed unlike any other country in the world these last 4 years.  There is no going back and the program is built to last this way.  I’m not worried about sliding back to something poor again.  The sleeping (relative) giant of CONCACAF has awoken.

[Kent]

To add a tiny bit to what @baulderdash77just said, the new BC league is starting up next year as well. Hopefully that can help develop players in the west like L1O and PLSQ have done in their provinces.

[VinceA]

On 10/17/2021 at 8:59 PM, Kent said:

To add a tiny bit to what @baulderdash77just said, the new BC league is starting up next year as well. Hopefully that can help develop players in the west like L1O and PLSQ have done in their provinces.

Should be noted that perusing through the usual call-ups for Canada and what a strongest XI or even 23 looks like, there's a huge dearth of BC products playing for us right now.

That needs to be a wake-up call. Vancouver touts itself for it's development but other than Davies and having a few guys who play for their first team their ain't much going on for the senior team.

[Kent]

39 minutes ago, VinceA said:

Should be noted that perusing through the usual call-ups for Canada and what a strongest XI or even 23 looks like, there's a huge dearth of BC products playing for us right now.

That needs to be a wake-up call. Vancouver touts itself for it's development but other than Davies and having a few guys who play for their first team their ain't much going on for the senior team.

Yes exactly. Hopefully the new league in BC can play a part in developing more players. Even if it's more of a rising tide kind of way in supplying better players for the CPL rather than outright developing a Davies level talent. For example the PLSQ, I'm not sure if there are any national team players that have played in PLSQ or not, but they have provided some of the more exciting players in CPL. If I'm not mistaken, Farsi, Abzi, and Toussaint are all from PLSQ. I'm sure there are others, and will definitely be others, especially once CPL is able to expand into Quebec.

[VinceA]

19 minutes ago, Kent said:

Yes exactly. Hopefully the new league in BC can play a part in developing more players. Even if it's more of a rising tide kind of way in supplying better players for the CPL rather than outright developing a Davies level talent. For example the PLSQ, I'm not sure if there are any national team players that have played in PLSQ or not, but they have provided some of the more exciting players in CPL. If I'm not mistaken, Farsi, Abzi, and Toussaint are all from PLSQ. I'm sure there are others, and will definitely be others, especially once CPL is able to expand into Quebec.

We've had PLSQ represented at the U23 level and probably will at the U20 level soon too.

[Corazon]

Canadians in MLS

Player	Team	Position	GP	GS	MP	G	A
Richie Laryea	Toronto	RB	25	24	2114	2	1
Russell Teibert	Vancouver	CM	29	25	2061	1	2
Kamal Miller	Montreal	CB	23	22	2017	0	3
Alistair Johnston	Nashville	RB	22	20	1784	1	1
Zach Brault-Guillard	Montreal	RB	26	19	1711	2	3
Mathieu Choiniere	Montreal	CM	22	20	1646	2	0
Mark Anthony Kaye	Colorado	CM	21	20	1604	1	3
Tajon Buchanan	New England	RW	24	17	1543	7	5
Joel Waterman	Montreal	CB	18	17	1509	0	3
Samuel Piette	Montreal	CM	21	16	1451	1	2
Cristian Gutierrez	Vancouver	LB	16	16	1409	0	3
Jonathan Osorio	Toronto	CM	21	16	1408	4	1
Tesho Akindele	Orlando	ST	29	15	1301	3	5
Zorhan Bassong	Montreal	LB	24	13	1233	0	1
Michael Baldisimo	Vancouver	CM	20	12	1227	0	0
Lucas Cavallini	Vancouver	ST	17	14	1192	3	1
Jay Chapman	Miami	CM	21	12	1056	0	1
Liam Fraser	Columbus (from Toronto)	CM	20	10	1028	0	0
Raheem Edwards	Los Angeles	LW	23	11	1024	0	0
Jacob Shaffelburg	Toronto	LW	17	9	815	3	3
Tyler Pasher	Houston	ST	16	9	776	4	3
Ayo Akinola	Toronto	ST	11	8	649	3	0
Ralph Priso	Toronto	CM	11	7	575	1	2
Noble Okello	Toronto	CM	10	7	539	1	0
Luke Singh	Toronto	CB	6	5	447	1	0
Ashtone Morgan	Salt Lake	LB	8	4	371	0	0
Ryan Raposo	Vancouver	CM	20	3	366	0	2
Patrick Metcalfe	Vancouver	CM	13	4	361	0	0
Clement Bayiha	Montreal	RB	10	2	281	0	0
Jahkeele Marshall-Rutty	Toronto	CM	7	1	195	0	1
Tosaint Ricketts	Vancouver	ST	14	0	173	0	0
Jayden Nelson	Toronto	RW	4	2	144	0	0
Derek Cornelious	Vancouver (to Panetolikos)	CB	5	1	144	0	0
Marcus Godinho	Vancouver	RB	4	1	114	0	0
Jordan Peruzza	Toronto (to San Antonio)	ST	3	0	74	0	0
Kamron Habibullah	Vancouver	CM	3	0	34	0	0
Theo Bair	Vancouver	ST	4	0	27	0	0
Ballou Jean-Yves Tabla	Montreal	ST	2	0	19	0	0
Rida Zouhir	Montreal	CM	2	0	16	0	0
Damiano Pecile	Vancouver (to Venezia)	CM
Simon Colyn	Vancouver (to SPAL)	CM
Gianfranco Facchineri	Vancouver	CB
Matteo Campagna	Vancouver	CM
Rocco Romeo	Toronto (to Valour)	CB
Julian Dunn-Johnson	Toronto	CB
Sean Rea	Montreal (to Valour FC)	CM
Tomas Giraldo	Montreal (to FC Edmonton)	CM
Karifa Yao	Montreal (to Cavalry FC)	CB
Keesean Ferdinand	Montreal (to Atletico Ottawa)	CB
Ismael Kone	Montreal	CM
Jean-Aniel Assi	Montreal	ST
Nathan-Dylan Saliba	Montreal	CM
Callum Montgomery	Minnesota (to San Diego)	CB
Player	Team	Position	GP	GS	MP	S	GA
Maxime Crepeau	Vancouver	GK	23	23	2070	77	27
James Pantemis	Montreal	GK	17	17	1530	48	26
Thomas Hasal	Vancouver	GK	7	7	630	20	14
Sebastian Breza	Montreal (from Bologna)	GK	5	5	450	13	5
Dayne St Clair	Minnesota	GK	4	4	360	11	10
Greg Ranjitsingh	Philadelphia	GK
Isaac Boehmer	Vancouver	GK
Jonathan Sirois	Montreal (to Valour FC)	GK

Edited October 21, 2021 by Corazon

[Corazon]

Canadians in MLS Continued

2019

Players - 32 - Minutes - 31,309 - Goals - 42 - Assists - 36

2020

Players - 41 - Minutes - 26,227 - Goals - 35 - Assists - 27

2020 (Calculated to a 34 Game Season)

Players - 41 - Minutes - 38,770 - Goals - 52 - Assists - 40

2021

Players - 44 - Minutes - 39,478 - Goals - 40 - Assists - 46

 

We have already surpassed the total Canadian players and total minutes played by Canadians over the past 3 seasons.  I do not have the statistics on previous MLS seasons but I would believe those are already two new record highs for Canadians in MLS history.  Not bad considering all the injuries to some regulars this season.  Gutierrez probably missed about 15 games.  Osorio 10 games.  Cavallini 10 games.  Pasher 15 games.  Ayo will miss about 25 games.  Priso will miss about 15 games as well.

Many of those players listed above that had injuries would normally contribute to goals & assists.  Cavallini, Osorio, Pasher & Ayo in particular would have contributed to more goals and assists.

Edited October 21, 2021 by Corazon

[Joe MacCarthy]

Not really sure what the purpose of this is, it is kinda disjointed.  I see it came from a YouTube account called Canada Soccer but it is not the CSA YT account so beware of vids coming from the non CSA verified YT account.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCHvanrxACXeF3ILd_OuIT-Q