Gold Cup - June 23rd 2019 - Canada vs Cuba

[aloyol]

2 hours ago, Grandbloke said:

Realistically, Cuba is a semi-minnow. I would start Crépeau against Cuba and save Borjan for Costa Rica or Haïti.

This "we must rest Borjan" is a curious trend....

[dyslexic nam]

Yeah, that is the one part I don’t get. Maybe I am misunderstanding the rigours of keeping but barring injury or a ridiculously busy game it doesn’t seem like a position where resting is needed. 

Mid we just want to give Crepeau some time that is one thing, but resting Milan seems unnecessary. 

[Grandbloke]

15 minutes ago, dyslexic nam said:

Yeah, that is the one part I don’t get. Maybe I am misunderstanding the rigours of keeping but barring injury or a ridiculously busy game it doesn’t seem like a position where resting is needed. 

Mid we just want to give Crepeau some time that is one thing, but resting Milan seems unnecessary. 

Crépeau deserves to play one game. If he doesn’t play against Cuba, he probably won’t get to play at all.

[hamiltonfan]

Not sure if posted early, claims of 4 additional Cuba defectors are surfacing. I understand that brings the total to 5.

We need the time together and should field our starting eleven

[apbsmith]

I personally think we rest Borjan...

More to do with injury prevention etc compared to standing in 30degree heat doing nothing for 2 hours. 

Cuba might get 1-2 corners against us and I'd be annoyed if  that 1% chance Borjan falls awkwardly or some Cuban takes a run at him, just not worth it in my eyes. 

I think of the game Busti started will be a similar workload so I'd give the game to Crepeau. 

4 games in 14 days ( 5 in 17 if Semi's) is probably manageable for a keeper but I'm 100% okay with the night off and training through.

It also does keep our #2 "semi-fresh"

Edited June 21, 2019 by apbsmith

[Gian-Luca]

25 minutes ago, hamiltonfan said:

Not sure if posted early, claims of 4 additional Cuba defectors are surfacing. I understand that brings the total to 5.

We need the time together and should field our starting eleven

Ouch. If the guy who got the red card last game isn’t one of them, that would make six players unavailable to play us

[Bertuzzi44]

1 hour ago, dyslexic nam said:

Yeah, that is the one part I don’t get. Maybe I am misunderstanding the rigours of keeping but barring injury or a ridiculously busy game it doesn’t seem like a position where resting is needed. 

Mid we just want to give Crepeau some time that is one thing, but resting Milan seems unnecessary. 

 

3 hours ago, aloyol said:

This "we must rest Borjan" is a curious trend....

I think giving Crepeau a start would be nice, but also sitting Borjan for the Cuba game guarantees he doesn't get injured for the knockout round (or something crazy like a red card).

[cronaldo7]

I would imagine Borjan gets to decide whether he would like to start or not.

[SkuseisLoose]

It’s going be hilarious reading this board when we rest Borjan but start leutwiler 😀.

[Blackdude]

23 minutes ago, SkuseisLoose said:

It’s going be hilarious reading this board when we rest Borjan but start leutwiler 😀.

Special K will be telling us all how he was right all along.

[Longrange]

wouldn't mind seeing Liam Millar get a start here. Also kinda curious about Noble Okello.. guy looked like he was towering over a few of the shorter players

[Ansem]

Why rest Borjan who's a keeper? I want to keep him sharp and avoid him going cold.

Crepeau...it's business, not personal 

 

[Gian-Luca]

As Honduras has found out the hard way, take nothing for granted. We have to start as close to our best as we can, particularly after deliberately not doing so in the previous match.

The last two times we faced Cuba in the final match of our opening round of the Gold Cup, we didn't get the job needed done (the last time was 2005 mind you so it is somewhat ancient history, but even so........)

[Alex]

Sources: Two other Cuban soccer players, Reinaldo Pérez "El Piolo" and Luismel Morris, have defected from the national team of #Cuba who participates in the @GoldCup . After that, there are already four team casualties towards the last match of the tournament

[BCM]

26 minutes ago, Alex said:

Sources: Two other Cuban soccer players, Reinaldo Pérez "El Piolo" and Luismel Morris, have defected from the national team of #Cuba who participates in the @GoldCup . After that, there are already four team casualties towards the last match of the tournament

At what point does Cuba simply stop traveling to the US for matches - is the GC prize money worth the embarrassment? 

[hamiltonfan]

16 minutes ago, Alex said:

Sources: Two other Cuban soccer players, Reinaldo Pérez "El Piolo" and Luismel Morris, have defected from the national team of #Cuba who participates in the @GoldCup . After that, there are already four team casualties towards the last match of the tournament

Starting to get concerned they will be unable to field a team. 4 to 7 players may have removed themselves from the team. We are one day out. What’s the lower limit on players required, 11? 13?

How many did they bring in? 

[Blackdude]

1 hour ago, hamiltonfan said:

Starting to get concerned they will be unable to field a team. 4 to 7 players may have removed themselves from the team. We are one day out. What’s the lower limit on players required, 11? 13?

7

[CanadaFan123]

That would suck for us and be just our luck wouldn’t it?  We need this match and I hope that Cuba is able to give us a decent look because we still have to play them twice more this year. 

It will be interesting to see how our squad mentally handles this match.  Cuba has typically been our kryptonite.. who could forget when they had 11 in Toronto and we only won 3-0.  Or when we played them in Olympic qualifying the past two tournaments and flunked both times.. particularly in 2012 after a win against the USA.  Hopefully Herdman keeps them focused and we can get a big win.

[king1010]

Who the heck is cuba going to have left to play in nations league? Whoever else they call up are just going to defect during nations league. 

Embarrassing. Its like they try so hard to qualify for these things so they get the opportunity to defect. 

Edited June 22, 2019 by king1010

[hamiltonfan]

From an humanitarian perspective, good for them. The players/citizens are battling much bigger issues than football 

Edited June 22, 2019 by hamiltonfan

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

1 hour ago, hamiltonfan said:

From an humanitarian perspective, good for them. They are battling much bigger issues than football 

I wouldn't say that exactly. Haiti is a much poorer country overall but simply don't have this pathway to permanent residency in the USA that Cubans have. I feel bitter-sweet about the whole situation.

Despite baseball being the dominant sport, you have so many quality footballers from the island; the problem here is the Asociación de Fútbol de Cuba, who unlike fellow communists North Korea, do not allow pro players to play for the National Team. Some of them, like Onel Hernandez, are willing to play free of charge! No pay!

I mean if they changed their rules, you could have CONCACAF nations league games in September where Cuba calls a Premier League player (when we have no one playing in that league anymore).

http://www.footballparadise.com/onel-hernandez-signs-four-year-deal-at-norwich/

______________________________________

Let's do the player subtraction on Cuba:

 

So Cuba started the tournament with a 22-man squad (Yordan Santa Cruz was denied a visa - if he did rape an American woman in Jamaica, the USA cannot charge him, only Jamaican authorities, but the USA can stop him from entering the country)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yordan_Santa_Cruz

http://www.goldcup.org/en/gold-cup/game-detail/476762#tab_match=match-details

 

Versus Martinique they dropped to 21 when captain Yasmani Lopez left:

http://www.goldcup.org/en/gold-cup/game-detail/476771#tab_match=match-details

 

During that game, Erick Rizo got a red card. That makes 20. 

Some reports are saying  Reynaldo Pérez, Luismel Morris and Daniel Luis Sáez have left

That makes 17.

http://www.razon.com.mx/deportes/tres-cubanos-mas-desertan-de-su-seleccion-en-la-copa-oro-concacaf-luismel-morris-daniel-luis-saez-reinaldo-perez-ultimas-noticias-de-futbol-internacional/

None of those guys are keepers http://www.goldcup.org/en/gold-cup/teams/2019/453#tab_team=roster

so that means they have to field a squad with 10 outfield players but can only pick from 14 players max.

Unless they sub their keeper for injury reasons, they've got 4 guys to pick from for their 3 subs.

Edited June 22, 2019 by Olympique_de_Marseille

[king1010]

Didnt they change their rules recently and allow pro players to play for their NT. they have players playing in the dominican, panama gutamala on their roster?

[Zem]

1 hour ago, Olympique_de_Marseille said:

Despite baseball being the dominant sport, you have so many quality footballers from the island; the problem here is the Asociación de Fútbol de Cuba, who unlike fellow communists North Korea, do not allow pro players to play for the National Team.

That is completely incorrect. The Cuban federation have long lobbied for players to be allowed to go abroad to play professionally and have specifically lobbied for Hernandez and other defectors to be allowed to play for the national team (in fact they tested the government by calling him up last November, but he was indeed barred from playing). Quote from Hernandez about what his mom told him after she contacted the federation about the issue:

“It’s very sad because we have good players around the world who want to come back and help,” he says. “We don’t need the money, we want to play for free. My mum spoke with the coach and the federation; she told me they don’t know what to do but they are fighting in the hope that one day we can come back and play. She said there are a lot of politicians that don’t really want to support football. Baseball, basketball, boxing, other sports, but not football. I don’t really know what the problem is, but it’s horrible.”

https://www.theguardian.com/football/2019/mar/29/onel-hernandez-cuba-carrow-road-norwich-city-championship

As @king1010 said, the government began allowing players to play professionally overseas beginning in 2016, and several players on Cuba's GC roster play professionally abroad (five in the Dominican, two in Guatemala and one in Panama). The difference with Hernandez is that while a law established in 2013 allows defectors like him and his family to return to Cuba after eight years, the government still doesn't allow defectors to play for the Cuban national team in any sport.

 

2 hours ago, Olympique_de_Marseille said:

I wouldn't say that exactly. Haiti is a much poorer country overall but simply don't have this pathway to permanent residency in the USA that Cubans have. I feel bitter-sweet about the whole situation.

This also technically isn't true anymore. The United States scrapped its policy which automatically gave Cuban defectors asylum in 2017, so in theory Cubans have to seek US residency on the same grounds as any other immigrant.

The defection issue still persists however, because as noted earlier the Cuban government doesn't allow defectors to return to Cuba for eight years, so once they travel without government permission they become effectively stateless and the US is obligated to grant them asylum as a result.

[CanadaFan123]

Surprisingly they do have a few players playing abroad for seemingly the first time ever.  But two of them are in the Guatemalan second division, including their top scorer from qualifying Paradela.

I saw someone else say this but wouldn’t it be nice if we could have a win-win where a few of their players play in CPL?  

[Tyson M]

For those of us in France... does anyone know if the Concacaf GO app will work here?

Also... Borjan will likely not start, not because he is resting, but likely because we don't need him(A la Busti during a very important qualifier). The difference between Borjan and Crepeau or Leutwiler will not be noticeable in this game. I am NOT saying that this will be a huge cake walk, but even if the keepers let in a goal (or even 2), you have to believe this Canada squad(not like any I've seen 20 years prior) can easily score 3. I do expect some changes(ex Hutch out/Liam in) but this will be a strong attacking squad.