The Road to Qatar.

[Cblake]

3 hours ago, narduch said:

El Salvador is playing a friendly tonight in DC v Bolivia

El Salvador is basically the home team in the DMV. They could put out a bunch of 5 year olds out there and sell out a 20K stadium, they have so much pride. The most concentrated population of El Salvadorians in the US is in the DC area. They are nuts for their team and country, I can respect that. 

Edited November 5, 2021 by Cblake

[Blackjack15]

 

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

On 11/5/2021 at 2:08 PM, narduch said:

El Salvador is playing a friendly tonight in DC v Bolivia

Fell to Bolivia. 0-1.

[Unnamed Trialist]

Today's UEFA rounds, plus matches in South America, and in Asia, are getting us closer to find out more qualified teams. This could have some effect on us if we manage to qualify ourselves, in terms of ranking and then seeding. 

UEFA will be done this week for the direct qualifiers, with a final round in the March window for the 2nd place finishers. Asia is half way through as we stand, with Saudia Arabia and Iran leading their respective groups; and Conmebol is past half way, 2/3rds, with Brazil and Argentina the only teams clear enough to be almost sure. Africa is just setting up for final group stages, I suppose also in the Jan and March windows. 

With most regions in competitive matches until March, Canada will have it harder to rise in the FIFA rankings. I think our best bets are to catch UEFA nations ahead of us who won't have competition in the new year. Of teams ahead of us, Greece, Slovakia, Hungary, Austria and one of Norway or Turkey will be out and won't be picking up points; we'll be playing 6 competitive matches after they are done. Scotland and Romania are still in the mix, as are Wales and Ukraine, at least for the playoffs, but if they qualify for them they'll have less matches. 

The draw for the Qatar groups will likely be 1 April, with only the 2 teams from the intercontinental playoffs pending.

Edited November 11, 2021 by Unnamed Trialist

[One American]

On 11/5/2021 at 4:24 PM, Cblake said:

El Salvador is basically the home team in the DMV. They could put out a bunch of 5 year olds out there and sell out a 20K stadium, they have so much pride. The most concentrated population of El Salvadorians in the US is in the DC area. They are nuts for their team and country, I can respect that. 

When Salvadorans play the USMNT in the US, their fans actually cheer both teams' goals. 

[Kent]

To @Unnamed Trialist's point, if we get 4 or 6 points this window, and a few more teams get eliminated from World Cup Qualifying, I might be tempted to see how many remaining teams are ranked below us.

[CanadaFan123]

Interesting. 

[dyslexic nam]

5 hours ago, CanadaFan123 said:

Interesting. 

I hope he doesn’t get too fancy and try to over-tinker with an eye to Mexico.  We absolutely must get 3 pts off CR tonight.  That is priority 1 this window.  Don’t overthink it.  Put out our best 11 and lock it down.  

[Unnamed Trialist]

7 hours ago, dyslexic nam said:

I hope he doesn’t get too fancy and try to over-tinker with an eye to Mexico.  We absolutely must get 3 pts off CR tonight.  That is priority 1 this window.  Don’t overthink it.  Put out our best 11 and lock it down.  

Posting from the airport?

I agree. The weather could be so harsh vs. Mexico that we'll just pantomime a 0-0 draw and shake hands. In fact, I'd love for that to happen, they win at US, we win over CR, then we meet in the freezing cold and agree on a draw. And if anyone tries anything funny, they get yelled at by their own teammates and we go back to exploring intricate midfield combinations.

[narduch]

8 hours ago, dyslexic nam said:

I hope he doesn’t get too fancy and try to over-tinker with an eye to Mexico.  We absolutely must get 3 pts off CR tonight.  That is priority 1 this window.  Don’t overthink it.  Put out our best 11 and lock it down.  

Maybe Eustaquio will sit. He's the most important player on a yellow

[Canadamnt]

9 minutes ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

Posting from the airport?

I agree. The weather could be so harsh vs. Mexico that we'll just pantomime a 0-0 draw and shake hands. In fact, I'd love for that to happen, they win at US, we win over CR, then we meet in the freezing cold and agree on a draw. And if anyone tries anything funny, they get yelled at by their own teammates and we go back to exploring intricate midfield combinations.

As much as everybody wants to get a win against Mexico, it is much more important to get 3 points against Costa Rica as we need to stop teams from behind us and not in front of us. 

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

48 minutes ago, narduch said:

Maybe Eustaquio will sit. He's the most important player on a yellow

I think Atiba and Larin will sit.

He doesn't want to play Atiba for 55+ minutes on turf and Larin may still have that stomach bug.

That's two top players in CONCACAF not starting.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Olympique_de_Marseille

[narduch]

10 minutes ago, Olympique_de_Marseille said:

I think Atiba and Larin will sit.

He doesn't want to play Atiba for 55+ minutes on turf and Larin may still have that stomach bug.

That's two top players in CONCACAF not starting.

I think Atiba will start and may fly back after the game 

[Sal333]

1 hour ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

Posting from the airport?

I agree. The weather could be so harsh vs. Mexico that we'll just pantomime a 0-0 draw and shake hands. In fact, I'd love for that to happen, they win at US, we win over CR, then we meet in the freezing cold and agree on a draw. And if anyone tries anything funny, they get yelled at by their own teammates and we go back to exploring intricate midfield combinations.

If this Canadian team attempts to do that, I'll lose all respect. Not that the players will give a damn about what I think.

Edited November 12, 2021 by Sal333

[Floortom]

4 minutes ago, narduch said:

I think Atiba will start and may fly back after the game 

I don’t think Atiba will fly back - for what? Besitkas is still on break. He stayed for the full period in window 1.

I agree he will start vs Costa Rica and not Mexico though. He’s a much better fit vs CR as we should have possession and CR will just sit back in a low block. Also the weather will be much better for him

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

11 minutes ago, Floortom said:

I don’t think Atiba will fly back - for what?

At one point, it was hinted at that he may not play both.

[dyslexic nam]

2 hours ago, Sal333 said:

If this Canadian team attempts to do that, I'll lose all respect. Not that the players will give a damn about what I think.

Not me.  4 points and done.  Perfectly content with that.  

[Unnamed Trialist]

2 hours ago, narduch said:

I think Atiba will start and may fly back after the game 

Agreed, because he is not on a card and three other key mids are. 

And sit one of Kaye or Eustaquio.

[Kent]

Occasionally people are bringing up the idea of sitting Eustaquio because he is on a card, or getting him to get himself a card to miss a specific game. I have to say I don't think the rest of the way out that strategy is smart at all. In the Gold Cup it made sense because we had qualified for the knockout round, with one more group stage game to go with little to nothing on the line. There was a massive imbalance between the importance of game #3 in that competition and game #4.

There is no massive imbalance in importance in these games. They are all worth 3, 1, or 0 points, depending on how we play. Some are a bit more important because it is against a team that could challenge for the same position we are going for, but it's not massive. And there are no games left where it seems insurmountable to get a win or unfathomable that we could lose. The closest thing to that scenario was the away game to Mexico, where we were unlikely to get a point (we did it, yay!) let alone a win. But at home to any of these teams we've got a good chance. On the road vs the Central American teams, it will be tough, but none of those games are write offs.

So you play Eustaquio whenever you can, and if he gets a card and has to miss the next game, then he misses a game. Let's not punish ourselves by making him miss a game to avoid having to miss a game. The same logic applies to every player. At this point I don't think it makes sense to take cards as a consideration for choosing a starting lineup. Subbing someone out when a game is virtually decided, sure, but not the starting lineup.

[Neil R.]

I like Kristian Jack's calculation that 21 points is an achievable target that probably puts you in a very strong position for either the intercontinental playoff spot or one of the automatic qualification spots, and that you can achieve 21 points if you average 2 points per game at home and 1 point per game away.

We're currently averaging 1 point per game away, and if we defeat Costa Rica tonight, our points per game average at home would be a very nice 2.5.

[A_Gagne]

Observations on the table at the halfway mark:

1) Top 4 vs bottom 4. There's clearly two groups within the group emerging. Unlikely Costa Rica, Jamaica or El Salvador can close the 5 point gap. Jamaica has 5 home games left, and the talent, so is the most plausible, but they'd have to run the table including away to Panama. I think that's unlikely especially without taking care of business tonight and showing no signs really of playing to their potential.

2) Panama away will be for all the marbles. Realistically Mexico and USA are likely to take 2 of the top 3 spots. That leaves us and Panama fighting for the other one. Yes we are up 2 points on them now, but they have 4 home games left to our 3, including playing us at home on the final match day. How many people here think we'll be three or more points up on them going into that game? Personally, I don't see that happening, so we'll probably end up needed a result on the last match day to avoid the playoff.

3) We're at least in the playoff. It wasn't pretty, but putting Costa Rica to the sword tonight, combined with Jamaica dropping points essentially guarantees us a top 4 spot. That's huge and we should celebrate it, but this team can and should push for more.

[TGAA_Star]

Canada should we get to Qatar, it gives us even more added experience for when we do host in 2026

[Unnamed Trialist]

We're the only undefeated team and that is not yet enough. Who'd have thought?

At least no-one can argue its easy. 

So far we haven't really been benefited by a rival result, although with their loss Mexico can't relax for their final six matches either. So that's good for us. They see the US and Panama at home still. 

As for Panama, since there's a group that can still trap them for a 4th spot, let's see them take a run. But hard to imagine much from El Salvador this week. 

One of the best results we could see is the US not winning at Jamaica. I think it's too bad Jamaica gave up that late goal to Roldan, I wouldn't mind to see them picking points off rivals as long as they're behind us. 

Before CR I predicted a 3-way tie at 14 points after this window. Now do you see why? 

[narduch]

A lot of people predicting 21 points will get you through. But Panama are in 4th and is currently on pace for 22. So that number might actually be 23 to auto qualify.

It's actually too bad that too many teams are starting to look out of it. However that may favour us next window with Honduras and El Salvador away.

That Honduras home draw still stings, especially considering they are now dead last on only 3 points.

[Floortom]

We need to start winning road games most likely. Panama has already beat Jamaica and Honduras away. The away draws have been good but we need to get a few wins now - Honduras and El Salvador being the most likely targets.