Jesse Costa

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

21 hours ago, frmr said:

Nothing like doing your due diligence.

The word bung would probably come to mind if it was the UK but nothing like that could ever happen in Canada of course.

[Bigandy]

17 hours ago, Macksam said:

It's a good thing history doesn't hold any weight when it comes to these things,  observing what happens on the field and how players and the team will progress is. 

I think the sentiment is that the team of 2000 had many high quality players and they didnt qualify.  To claim that our roster in the 2017 gold cup was obviously going to qualify seems strange. But youre right observing what happens on the field and how players progress is the ultimate answer.

unfortunantly, the majority of the 2017 gold cup squad are far far far below the levels of our national team. There are very few from that tournament that progressed positively. Davies, larin and sam. 

Piette, oso, cav, hoilett all contribute but havnt made any steps up in terms of the leagues they are playing in or huge strides in their development. 

The 2017 gold cup team was a typical canadian team....not good. 

[CanadaFan123]

13 hours ago, Bigandy said:

I think the sentiment is that the team of 2000 had many high quality players and they didnt qualify.  To claim that our roster in the 2017 gold cup was obviously going to qualify seems strange. But youre right observing what happens on the field and how players progress is the ultimate answer.

unfortunantly, the majority of the 2017 gold cup squad are far far far below the levels of our national team. There are very few from that tournament that progressed positively. Davies, larin and sam. 

Piette, oso, cav, hoilett all contribute but havnt made any steps up in terms of the leagues they are playing in or huge strides in their development. 

The 2017 gold cup team was a typical canadian team....not good. 

You’re misremembering then. Following that Gold Cup Cavallini moved to Liga MX and MAK & Piette moved to MLS (he was great that tournament). 
 

That 2017 team was the start of something special and we all knew it. All you have to do is look at the fact 11 players from that team were on our World Cup squad. 

[Bigandy]

On 4/29/2023 at 3:36 AM, CanadaFan123 said:

You’re misremembering then. Following that Gold Cup Cavallini moved to Liga MX and MAK & Piette moved to MLS (he was great that tournament). 
 

That 2017 team was the start of something special and we all knew it. All you have to do is look at the fact 11 players from that team were on our World Cup squad. 

Cav to Liga MX is not a substantial move. Neither is Piette moving from europe to mls. MAK going for usl to mls is an improvement but not substantial like going to a top 5 league. 

If we didnt add all the duals and have all the emerging guys who went on to be top players for canada, we wouldnt have made the WC. 

Basically if MAK moves up to mls and takes the spot of an older player who retires, and we get a young guy in the USL who follows MAK path, we wouldnt make the WC. 

The reason we made it is because 1. a coaching change. 2. We added Miller, Buchanan, Johnston, Laryea, David, Staq as starters. Ugbo, Millar, spoony,  Kone, kennedy, waterman, cornelius as subs.  

From the 2017 gold cup only davies, vitoria, oso, larin are starters for canada. Having 11 players from the gold cup speaks more to our lack of depth than the quality of the gold cup squad. Guys like piette, MAK, Cav, all are squad players with roles but we really should be hoping for higher quality players at this point. 

In 2017 we had arfield as our only player in a decent league in europe. larin and davies are the only other ones to get substantial moves from the GC squad. 

The stats say you need a minimum number of top 5 league players to make the WC and advance. Take away all our european (future euro - buchanan kone johnston etc) and go with the 2017 gold cup squad standard and we are no where near qualifying for the WC.  

I am shocked that people think a team with so many 2nd and 3rd tier players with only 1 win against french guina is considered special.... maybe win against hondorous before the team can be considered special.

[InglewoodJack]

👍

[VinceA]

How tf is Canada missing the trick with this? It's been a month since he mentioned the development camp from Portugal. Was Canada supposed to scramble and make a new U20 camp for one player for a program where we have no games coming up?

Now I will always criticize the CSA and how they handle the money but it's been reported regularly we're poor and them "missing the trick" is a stupid take for a player who has a long way to go before the senior team calls, which is the ultimate goal.

[InglewoodJack]

22 minutes ago, VinceA said:

How tf is Canada missing the trick with this? It's been a month since he mentioned the development camp from Portugal. Was Canada supposed to scramble and make a new U20 camp for one player for a program where we have no games coming up?

Now I will always criticize the CSA and how they handle the money but it's been reported regularly we're poor and them "missing the trick" is a stupid take for a player who has a long way to go before the senior team calls, which is the ultimate goal.

“Missing the trick” refers to the whole fact he’s playing for another nation. We know we’re “poor”, and now we’re seeing that poverty in action, as a player who has very deep interest in playing for Canada playing for another team. 

[frmr]

31 minutes ago, VinceA said:

How tf is Canada missing the trick with this? It's been a month since he mentioned the development camp from Portugal. Was Canada supposed to scramble and make a new U20 camp for one player for a program where we have no games coming up?

Now I will always criticize the CSA and how they handle the money but it's been reported regularly we're poor and them "missing the trick" is a stupid take for a player who has a long way to go before the senior team calls, which is the ultimate goal.

Because we don't have a program for youth players who want to play international football to attach themselves to, so they attach themselves to other countries, which creates a huge risk in losing them forever. We've seen this repeatedly over the years—how is this even a question at this point?

edit: to clarify, I think they're referring to the big picture "missing a trick", not a single granular occurrence.

Edited May 3, 2023 by frmr

[VinceA]

17 minutes ago, InglewoodJack said:

“Missing the trick” refers to the whole fact he’s playing for another nation. We know we’re “poor”, and now we’re seeing that poverty in action, as a player who has very deep interest in playing for Canada playing for another team. 

9 minutes ago, frmr said:

Because we don't have a program for youth players who want to play international football to attach themselves to, so they attach themselves to other countries, which creates a huge risk in losing them forever. We've seen this repeatedly over the years—how is this even a question at this point?

Why wouldn't a dual-national play some more international ball with another country if Canada can't give them any? That has been the case with many dual-nationals who ended up playing for us eventually so that's why I'm not worried.

Veth is just fear-mongering to get engagements.

Question for you guys. What would you have Canada do then? Message him and tell him what exactly? Say no to Portugal's youth side and potentially hurt his professional career? Playing for Portgual's youth teams gets more eyes on him. What would we promise him? A call-up to the Nations League or Gold Cup? Why would Herdman do that? This isn't 2018 and Liam Millar.

Costa is a 2005 with Wolfsburg. It is a long way to the senior team, he's not a lock to make it at all. If he makes his pro debut soonish then yeah I imagine the CSA will try to bring him into the senior fold. Otherwise he's still eligible next year for our U20s in 2024 trying to get to the 2025 FIFA U20 WC. If he rejects that then sure there's questions to be asked.

But Lucas Dias also rejected our U20s and he's still playing reserve ball and he's 20. I doubt Portugal is tripping over themselves to cap him.

Edited May 3, 2023 by VinceA

[Bison44]

How could they have gotten the "trick"?  Where would they have come up with another couple million to run some camps for youth program to keep duals interested in canada? 

1) gotten the men to play that damn friendly and not lose millions

2) told the women their money will be cut even more

3) told both men/women to get stuffed and they only get a 20/20% cut of the mens 10million WC money and had a few million left for a youth program

All bad options that would be cut to pieces on this board and by media.  There is dittly doo they can do about this, with the senior men and women both wanting more and more and there isnt another big influx of money coming anytime soon.  Maybe the women make a ton of cash of their pre WC friendly and it can be funneled into the youth program, they didnt have any problem taking a chunk of the mens windfall when they needed it eh?? Share and share alike I always say.  Maybe the men can make a ton of their games this summer, but it seems like they want to price out most fans.  UGGHH.  Or maybe they are banking that offering a kid a chance to get onto a squad that is going to the WC in 2026 is enough to get them to commit to canada. Either way, its a big shit sandwich and we all have to take a bite.  

 

[frmr]

6 minutes ago, VinceA said:

Why wouldn't a dual-national play some more international ball with another country if Canada can't give them any? That has been the case with many dual-nationals who ended up playing for us eventually so that's why I'm not worried.

Veth is just fear-mongering to get engagements.

Question for you guys. What would you have Canada do then? Message him and tell him what exactly? Say no to Portugal's youth side and potentially hurt his professional career? Playing for Portgual's youth teams gets more eyes on him. What would we promise him? A call-up to the Nations League or Gold Cup? Why would Herdman do that? This isn't 2018 and Liam Millar.

Costa is a 2005 with Wolfsburg. It is a long way to the senior team, he's not a lock to make it at all. If he makes his pro debut soonish then yeah I imagine the CSA will try to bring him into the senior fold. Otherwise he's still eligible next year for our U20s in 2024 trying to get to the 2025 FIFA U20 WC. If he rejects that then sure there's questions to be asked.

But Lucas Dias also rejected our U20s and he's still playing reserve ball and he's 20. I doubt Portugal is tripping over themselves to cap him.

He's really not fear-mongering, he's just stating a fact. It's good that you're not worried, but you, nor anyone else, has any idea how it will pan out. We may lose him to Portugal, we may not. The bottom line is Canada can't offer him meaningful youth football, so he's playing for Portugal. He may come back to Canada, he may not. Whether you agree with Veth's wording or not, the fact is that any time that a player puts on a shirt other that Canada, it's a risk that they will stay. Once he gets into the Portugal set up, he might not want to leave. We've seen this before, I'm sure we'll see it again as long as our young players need to look for greener pastures.

To answer your question, I would want Canada Soccer to stop shooting itself in the foot for a long enough run to actually be able to afford to give young players a meaningful youth setup so they don't feel like they need to jump ship (if only temporarily) to play for other countries. Any time a Canadian puts on another country's shirt, it should be seen as a failure on Canada Soccer's part.

Just my opinion of course.

[Dominic94]

Reality is that CSA has bigger worries right now then this kid. 

[InglewoodJack]

39 minutes ago, VinceA said:

Why wouldn't a dual-national play some more international ball with another country if Canada can't give them any? That has been the case with many dual-nationals who ended up playing for us eventually so that's why I'm not worried.

To be clear, I don't fault Costa for taking the call from Portugal one bit- you'd be crazy not to entertain them, considering what it could do for your career. The issue is that he doesn't have a second option to weigh the call up against, because we have nothing to offer him other than bringing him into the senior camp, and I guess cynically cap tying him, which he probably doesn't want, for obvious reasons. 

Yeah, he still might come back at some point, but like you say below, this isn't 2018. We can't build a team with the scrap that better countries discard, hoping that every washed up dual national turns into Stephen Eustaquio. If Costa doesn't progress and suddenly Portugal doesn't want him, that likely means he's no longer a Bundesliga talent, it means he's likely on his way for a modest career, and that's probably good enough to play for us, but by no means a difference maker. A player of that profile, like Ike Ugbo, is nice to have in the system, but doesn't do much for us. We need to get first crack at our players, especially the ones who actually want to play for us, but we aren't, because we have nothing to offer them.

40 minutes ago, VinceA said:

 

Veth is just fear-mongering to get engagements.

Question for you guys. What would you have Canada do then? Message him and tell him what exactly? Say no to Portugal's youth side and potentially hurt his professional career? Playing for Portgual's youth teams gets more eyes on him. What would we promise him? A call-up to the Nations League or Gold Cup? Why would Herdman do that? This isn't 2018 and Liam Millar.

Costa is a 2005 with Wolfsburg. It is a long way to the senior team, he's not a lock to make it at all. If he makes his pro debut soonish then yeah I imagine the CSA will try to bring him into the senior fold. Otherwise he's still eligible next year for our U20s in 2024 trying to get to the 2025 FIFA U20 WC. If he rejects that then sure there's questions to be asked.

But Lucas Dias also rejected our U20s and he's still playing reserve ball and he's 20. I doubt Portugal is tripping over themselves to cap him.

What would I do if I was Canada? We should invest more in youth teams, more camps, build a bond between these guys as they age through the system. At this point we're all yelling at a wall- get more money into soccer- everyone knows that's the issue and there's nothing to do about it.

As for Costa, it is a long way to the senior team, but we know all of these national teams speak to clubs and get a sense of where their players are at. You can imagine at Portugal has extremely deep connections all across Europe and they're going to recruit players who have the potential to become who we think they are. If they didn't rate him, they'd give his spot to the countless other Portugese youth players playing in tier 1 academies his spot. This isn't a country that needs to convince every youth player with a fancy club affiliation to play for them, they want guys who will develop into future stars. If he makes his Bundesliga debut soon, he'll be an 18 year old Bundesliga player, which is probably enough for Portugal to do anything in their power to keep him in their system; at that point, it'll be too late.

As for a nations league or gold cup call up, I'm fine with giving him the Koleosho treatment. Hell, give anyone the Koleosho treatment- I'd be happy if we at least tried to get one of these high upside dual nationals to choose us first. Last year it was Mitrovic, this year it's Costa, before long it's going to be Sigur, then De Fougerolles, then in 2025, it's gonna be some kid CF Montreal wouldn't even give a trial to that's gonna sign for Ajax and cap for some random country.

Bottom line is that we don't have a youth set up to grow these players properly, and we're going to lose more and more of them. We all know this, anyone who has followed the sport for more than 6 months knows this, and it makes following these players' progress difficult, because we know that either they reach their potential and go elsewhere, or they don't end up as good and play for us.

[Soccerpro2]

1 hour ago, InglewoodJack said:

To be clear, I don't fault Costa for taking the call from Portugal one bit- you'd be crazy not to entertain them, considering what it could do for your career. The issue is that he doesn't have a second option to weigh the call up against, because we have nothing to offer him other than bringing him into the senior camp, and I guess cynically cap tying him, which he probably doesn't want, for obvious reasons. 

Yeah, he still might come back at some point, but like you say below, this isn't 2018. We can't build a team with the scrap that better countries discard, hoping that every washed up dual national turns into Stephen Eustaquio. If Costa doesn't progress and suddenly Portugal doesn't want him, that likely means he's no longer a Bundesliga talent, it means he's likely on his way for a modest career, and that's probably good enough to play for us, but by no means a difference maker. A player of that profile, like Ike Ugbo, is nice to have in the system, but doesn't do much for us. We need to get first crack at our players, especially the ones who actually want to play for us, but we aren't, because we have nothing to offer them.

What would I do if I was Canada? We should invest more in youth teams, more camps, build a bond between these guys as they age through the system. At this point we're all yelling at a wall- get more money into soccer- everyone knows that's the issue and there's nothing to do about it.

As for Costa, it is a long way to the senior team, but we know all of these national teams speak to clubs and get a sense of where their players are at. You can imagine at Portugal has extremely deep connections all across Europe and they're going to recruit players who have the potential to become who we think they are. If they didn't rate him, they'd give his spot to the countless other Portugese youth players playing in tier 1 academies his spot. This isn't a country that needs to convince every youth player with a fancy club affiliation to play for them, they want guys who will develop into future stars. If he makes his Bundesliga debut soon, he'll be an 18 year old Bundesliga player, which is probably enough for Portugal to do anything in their power to keep him in their system; at that point, it'll be too late.

As for a nations league or gold cup call up, I'm fine with giving him the Koleosho treatment. Hell, give anyone the Koleosho treatment- I'd be happy if we at least tried to get one of these high upside dual nationals to choose us first. Last year it was Mitrovic, this year it's Costa, before long it's going to be Sigur, then De Fougerolles, then in 2025, it's gonna be some kid CF Montreal wouldn't even give a trial to that's gonna sign for Ajax and cap for some random country.

Bottom line is that we don't have a youth set up to grow these players properly, and we're going to lose more and more of them. We all know this, anyone who has followed the sport for more than 6 months knows this, and it makes following these players' progress difficult, because we know that either they reach their potential and go elsewhere, or they don't end up as good and play for us.

There’s no money for youth camps right now. I have no love for the CSA administration but that doesn’t change the fact that there isn’t any money. I don’t see how anyone can change that fact.

[frmr]

So what other federations that are comparable to us also do not have money for youth camps? It seems like the de facto end to this line of questioning is simply that “there is no money”. So if that’s just a perfectly normal and acceptable state of being for a federation like ours, which of our peers are in the same position as us? And if this is a uniquely Canadian problem, then why? 

[Soccerpro2]

3 hours ago, frmr said:

So what other federations that are comparable to us also do not have money for youth camps? It seems like the de facto end to this line of questioning is simply that “there is no money”. So if that’s just a perfectly normal and acceptable state of being for a federation like ours, which of our peers are in the same position as us? And if this is a uniquely Canadian problem, then why? 

The CSA board has done a terrible job, everyone agrees.

Federations comparable to us = not sure that exists with our financial position, incompetence and labour strife.

Everybody knows the CSA has been poorly run. Pointing that out doesn’t create a pot of money that doesn’t exist.

If you have a solution to fund youth camps besides “sack the CSA” - which has already happened, let’s hear it.

Edited May 4, 2023 by Soccerpro2

[ballerz]

4 hours ago, frmr said:

So what other federations that are comparable to us also do not have money for youth camps? It seems like the de facto end to this line of questioning is simply that “there is no money”. So if that’s just a perfectly normal and acceptable state of being for a federation like ours, which of our peers are in the same position as us? And if this is a uniquely Canadian problem, then why? 

We are Canada in 2023. I would say more than 80% of our entire population qualify as dual nationals under FIFA rules. Yes, this a unique problem. It is time to force the top 10 corporations in Canada to sponsor soccer - $1m per annum. What about Huawei? If we are going to sell ourselves to China and endanger our national interests, at least Huawei can host our youth camps. 

[frmr]

1 hour ago, Soccerpro2 said:

The CSA board has done a terrible job, everyone agrees.

Federations comparable to us = not sure that exists with our financial position, incompetence and labour strife.

Everybody knows the CSA has been poorly run. Pointing that out doesn’t create a pot of money that doesn’t exist.

If you have a solution to fund youth camps besides “sack the CSA” - which has already happened, let’s hear it.

Not my station. Merely explaining why another young player suiting up for a different country is considered "missing a trick".

[InglewoodJack]

13 hours ago, Soccerpro2 said:

There’s no money for youth camps right now. I have no love for the CSA administration but that doesn’t change the fact that there isn’t any money. I don’t see how anyone can change that fact.

Yeah, like I said, it's the thing we always go back to- we have no money for these camps, so these camps don't happen. Canada isn't a uniquely disadvantaged nation, we went to the last world cup as one of the richest countries in the entire tournament, and now we can't even give the young players who actually want to play for Canada a shot to do so. Toronto has a GDP 5 times the size of Ghana- Ghana gets results at the world cup, Toronto can't even guarantee its players even play for Canada.

 

 

[El Hombre]

16 hours ago, InglewoodJack said:

What would I do if I was Canada? We should invest more in youth teams, more camps, build a bond between these guys as they age through the system. At this point we're all yelling at a wall- get more money into soccer- everyone knows that's the issue and there's nothing to do about it.

I think that is an incredibly simplistic solution to compete with the likes of Portugal.  Based on a cursory web search, it looks like Portugal, within a two week span at the end of March: had a Friendly camp for their U-21 team, "Elite League" games for their U-20s, U-19 Championship qualification for their U-19s, and U-17 Championship qualification for their U-17s.  The only team that didn't play was their U-18s so I guess they get a camp in May?

A couple conclusions can be drawn from this:

1) We don't just need a bit of money to compete with Portugal for a kid like Costa, we need a shit-ton.  Especially when you consider flying the high-profile kids you want to capture over from Europe.

2) Good for Costa to get this callup, but based on this activity he is one of 30+ midfielders born between 2001 and 2006 who have pulled on a Portuguese youth jersey in the past month or two.  Seems like they have a shotgun approach.  Again, very difficult for a country like Canada to compete with that.

In all my time here, the most money I saw dropped into youth teams was Rob Gale's U20 team in 2016.  That team had Tomori on it and also Bustos who played footsie with Chile off and on for a couple years.  So investing more money may not be the skeleton key for this problem.

16 hours ago, InglewoodJack said:

As for a nations league or gold cup call up, I'm fine with giving him the Koleosho treatment. Hell, give anyone the Koleosho treatment- I'd be happy if we at least tried to get one of these high upside dual nationals to choose us first. Last year it was Mitrovic, this year it's Costa, before long it's going to be Sigur, then De Fougerolles, then in 2025, it's gonna be some kid CF Montreal wouldn't even give a trial to that's gonna sign for Ajax and cap for some random country.

Koleosho is an interesting case study.  We rolled out the red carpet for him twice when it was probably our most critical time to get our team together (ie. pre-WC) and yet he's still toying with other countries.  So, was this a good investment or a bad one?  Also, worth noting that Koleosho turned down a chance to play with our U20s when they needed him for qualification.  If we have people turning us down to play in a Concacaf qualifying game, what chance are they going to come over for a camp in Alliston ON with friendlies against Ventura County FC and Vaughn Azzurri?

The rest of the names you mention seem to be key passengers on the Northern Futbol hype train.  Those guys are king makers around here and they love to focus on their European academy stars.  Costa was part of our U20 team but only played the first half and then never saw the pitch again.  That could be down coaching, but we also saw that some of the top performers on that team were guys like Kwasi Poku and Lowell Wright.  Noah Abatneh came in with Lazio pedigree but was outplayed by a kid playing ball in Hamilton.  We saw the same with Higazy and the U-17s.

We seem to still have an inferiority complex about European academies.  Yes if a kid is playing in a European academy, they may turn out to be a great player.  Or they may flame out like so many other kids we've seen.  Who knows.  No need to get bent out of shape though.

16 hours ago, InglewoodJack said:

Bottom line is that we don't have a youth set up to grow these players properly, and we're going to lose more and more of them. We all know this, anyone who has followed the sport for more than 6 months knows this, and it makes following these players' progress difficult, because we know that either they reach their potential and go elsewhere, or they don't end up as good and play for us.

It's almost like we need a domestic league in Canada that prioritises youth minutes so that we can keep players like this in Canada and also give them a future?

CanPL is supposed to do exactly what you are looking for.  The more it grows and the more it establishes itself, the more of these young kids we'll catch before they decide to go the European route.  A kid like Sigur going to Hajduk Split is a failure of the CanPL, not the CSA in my opinion.  We need those teams to catch kids like him.  However, if you pull that string a bit more, you have to ask yourself, how did Hajduk get wind of him but not any of the CanPL teams?  Is Hajduk scouting York Lions games?  Or was this kid hellbent on going to Croatia?

You want to help youth programs in Canada?  Go out and support the CanPL teams.  Help that league grow.  They'll catch more of these kids and keep them in Canada where it will be much more affordable to run youth camps and identification camps with them and the MLS teams.

The same thing happened with Twardek.  That kid was going to the Czech Republic come hell or high water.  There is nothing you could do to stop that.  And that's really the main lesson here.  Kids like these are advised by agents from a young age.  They'll do what's in their best interest.  You can beat yourself up about "We should've done this..." or "We should've done that..." but at the end of the day Costa and Koleosho and Mitrovic and all these kids will do what is in their best interests.  And sometimes that won't include Canada.  We just go out and support the ones where it does.

[An Observer]

1 hour ago, El Hombre said:

I think that is an incredibly simplistic solution to compete with the likes of Portugal.  Based on a cursory web search, it looks like Portugal, within a two week span at the end of March: had a Friendly camp for their U-21 team, "Elite League" games for their U-20s, U-19 Championship qualification for their U-19s, and U-17 Championship qualification for their U-17s.  The only team that didn't play was their U-18s so I guess they get a camp in May?

A couple conclusions can be drawn from this:

1) We don't just need a bit of money to compete with Portugal for a kid like Costa, we need a shit-ton.  Especially when you consider flying the high-profile kids you want to capture over from Europe.

2) Good for Costa to get this callup, but based on this activity he is one of 30+ midfielders born between 2001 and 2006 who have pulled on a Portuguese youth jersey in the past month or two.  Seems like they have a shotgun approach.  Again, very difficult for a country like Canada to compete with that.

In all my time here, the most money I saw dropped into youth teams was Rob Gale's U20 team in 2016.  That team had Tomori on it and also Bustos who played footsie with Chile off and on for a couple years.  So investing more money may not be the skeleton key for this problem.

Koleosho is an interesting case study.  We rolled out the red carpet for him twice when it was probably our most critical time to get our team together (ie. pre-WC) and yet he's still toying with other countries.  So, was this a good investment or a bad one?  Also, worth noting that Koleosho turned down a chance to play with our U20s when they needed him for qualification.  If we have people turning us down to play in a Concacaf qualifying game, what chance are they going to come over for a camp in Alliston ON with friendlies against Ventura County FC and Vaughn Azzurri?

The rest of the names you mention seem to be key passengers on the Northern Futbol hype train.  Those guys are king makers around here and they love to focus on their European academy stars.  Costa was part of our U20 team but only played the first half and then never saw the pitch again.  That could be down coaching, but we also saw that some of the top performers on that team were guys like Kwasi Poku and Lowell Wright.  Noah Abatneh came in with Lazio pedigree but was outplayed by a kid playing ball in Hamilton.  We saw the same with Higazy and the U-17s.

We seem to still have an inferiority complex about European academies.  Yes if a kid is playing in a European academy, they may turn out to be a great player.  Or they may flame out like so many other kids we've seen.  Who knows.  No need to get bent out of shape though.

It's almost like we need a domestic league in Canada that prioritises youth minutes so that we can keep players like this in Canada and also give them a future?

CanPL is supposed to do exactly what you are looking for.  The more it grows and the more it establishes itself, the more of these young kids we'll catch before they decide to go the European route.  A kid like Sigur going to Hajduk Split is a failure of the CanPL, not the CSA in my opinion.  We need those teams to catch kids like him.  However, if you pull that string a bit more, you have to ask yourself, how did Hajduk get wind of him but not any of the CanPL teams?  Is Hajduk scouting York Lions games?  Or was this kid hellbent on going to Croatia?

You want to help youth programs in Canada?  Go out and support the CanPL teams.  Help that league grow.  They'll catch more of these kids and keep them in Canada where it will be much more affordable to run youth camps and identification camps with them and the MLS teams.

The same thing happened with Twardek.  That kid was going to the Czech Republic come hell or high water.  There is nothing you could do to stop that.  And that's really the main lesson here.  Kids like these are advised by agents from a young age.  They'll do what's in their best interest.  You can beat yourself up about "We should've done this..." or "We should've done that..." but at the end of the day Costa and Koleosho and Mitrovic and all these kids will do what is in their best interests.  And sometimes that won't include Canada.  We just go out and support the ones where it does.

I agree with everything said in this post.  Should Canada put more money into youth camps? Yes.  Does the CSA have more money to be put into youth camps? No.  Should they raise more sponsorships to do it either through CSB or otherwise? Yes but frankly the focus in the short term needs to be solving the governance issues so they have the platform to do it going forward.  Even if they had that money and did do more youth camps, would that solve the issue?  No, many of these players will try their luck elsewhere or have their own preferences so they will just utlise all these opportunities including the increasing ones Canada could offer.   Would it embedd some of these players who had increased opportunities from a Canada youth stucture into our program?  Probably for a select few but generally, their motivations will be formed by what they deem is in their best interest or is attuned with their own desires (eg. how Canadian they feel compared to their other nationality(s)) whether they played youth for us or not.

 

[InglewoodJack]

27 minutes ago, El Hombre said:

I think that is an incredibly simplistic solution to compete with the likes of Portugal.  Based on a cursory web search, it looks like Portugal, within a two week span at the end of March: had a Friendly camp for their U-21 team, "Elite League" games for their U-20s, U-19 Championship qualification for their U-19s, and U-17 Championship qualification for their U-17s.  The only team that didn't play was their U-18s so I guess they get a camp in May?

I'm fine with losing players to Portugal- like I said, it's a very hard offer to turn down, and until we get to their level (and we won't, at least for the next few generations), players will follow the best opportunity available to them. My issue is that Costa specifically wants to play for Canada, and we don't have anything now or in the near future to offer him. We won't ever be able to "compete" with Portugal, but in the off chance we have a high potential young player, or several like we do right now, they should have more opportunities to play for Canada and get integrated. I think Lucas Dias turned down an offer from us- not sure if it was to hold out for Portugal or to focus on club minutes, but regardless, I'm not too fussed over that because we tried, he said no, it is what it is.

29 minutes ago, El Hombre said:

Koleosho is an interesting case study.  We rolled out the red carpet for him twice when it was probably our most critical time to get our team together (ie. pre-WC) and yet he's still toying with other countries.  So, was this a good investment or a bad one?  Also, worth noting that Koleosho turned down a chance to play with our U20s when they needed him for qualification.  If we have people turning us down to play in a Concacaf qualifying game, what chance are they going to come over for a camp in Alliston ON with friendlies against Ventura County FC and Vaughn Azzurri?

I like what we did with Koleosho. He's a high potential prospect with very loose ties to Canada. It looks like we lost him, but we did everything we could to keep him. Italy came calling, he's obviously going to say yes to that, just like he'll likely accept a Spain call up if it ever comes. I'd be pissed if we let, say, Nigeria swoop in and cap him when we didn't try, but we brought him into camps, we integrated him, but something better came along. It's fine.

27 minutes ago, El Hombre said:

 

The rest of the names you mention seem to be key passengers on the Northern Futbol hype train.  Those guys are king makers around here and they love to focus on their European academy stars.  Costa was part of our U20 team but only played the first half and then never saw the pitch again.  That could be down coaching, but we also saw that some of the top performers on that team were guys like Kwasi Poku and Lowell Wright.  Noah Abatneh came in with Lazio pedigree but was outplayed by a kid playing ball in Hamilton.  We saw the same with Higazy and the U-17s.

 

We seem to still have an inferiority complex about European academies.  Yes if a kid is playing in a European academy, they may turn out to be a great player.  Or they may flame out like so many other kids we've seen.  Who knows.  No need to get bent out of shape though.

It's almost like we need a domestic league in Canada that prioritises youth minutes so that we can keep players like this in Canada and also give them a future?

CanPL is supposed to do exactly what you are looking for.  The more it grows and the more it establishes itself, the more of these young kids we'll catch before they decide to go the European route.  A kid like Sigur going to Hajduk Split is a failure of the CanPL, not the CSA in my opinion.  We need those teams to catch kids like him.  However, if you pull that string a bit more, you have to ask yourself, how did Hajduk get wind of him but not any of the CanPL teams?  Is Hajduk scouting York Lions games?  Or was this kid hellbent on going to Croatia?

You want to help youth programs in Canada?  Go out and support the CanPL teams.  Help that league grow.  They'll catch more of these kids and keep them in Canada where it will be much more affordable to run youth camps and identification camps with them and the MLS teams.

The same thing happened with Twardek.  That kid was going to the Czech Republic come hell or high water.  There is nothing you could do to stop that.  And that's really the main lesson here.  Kids like these are advised by agents from a young age.  They'll do what's in their best interest.  You can beat yourself up about "We should've done this..." or "We should've done that..." but at the end of the day Costa and Koleosho and Mitrovic and all these kids will do what is in their best interests.  And sometimes that won't include Canada.  We just go out and support the ones where it does.

I don't know that the discrepancy between european players and CPL players is because of overrated europe-based players more than the fact that a professional player will be better than an amateur at that specific point in time, but that says nothing about their potential. Another U20 standout was Justin Smith, and I'm going to bet a big factor in that is that Nice II plays in the French pyramid and he had a season against professional players. For the guys based in Italy, yeah, Italian academies are notoriously terrible for our players, and at this point, I assume all will eventually go elsewhere.

I've talked a lot on here about us needing the CPL to do exactly what you're saying- I'd much rather a 17 year old getting regular minutes in the CPL than being in some academy. We've seen some successes there- Mo Farsi was turned down by Montreal something like 5 times, and eventually went to the CPL, and is now killing it with Columbus. I'd like to see more of that.

The bottom line is that we're going to lose players for a number of very valid reasons, but we should never lose a player who wants to play for us but doesn't due to lack of opportunity. I'm fine losing Koleosho, we tried and he got a better opportunity with countries he has stronger ties with. I'm fine with losing Flores because he was never going to actually play for us. It's guys like Mitrovic, where there was interest, even until the last second, but he was passed over by every CPL team, he wasn't given much of an opportunity to play for Canada. Costa wants to play for us, but we don't have much to offer him.

 

I

[Approve My Account Pls]

Whats the deal with this tournament? Is it just a friendly tournament or?

Edited May 30, 2023 by Approve My Account Pls

[jordan]

José Lima, coach of the under-18 National Team, summoned 22 players to the Lisbon International Tournament. Sporting and SC Braga are the most represented clubs, with four players each. In this 27th edition of the tournament, Portugal will face Australia (June 9), Norway (June 11) and England (June 13).

https://www.abola.pt/nnh/2023-05-30/convocatoria-para-o-torneio-internacional-de-lisboa/989884

[Unnamed Trialist]

Friendly tournament in a non-official age bracket, but still an honour for the kid.