WCQ | Window 1 | Match Day 3: Canada vs El Salvador- Wednesday, Sept 8th, 7:30pm Eastern / 4:30pm Pacific - Toronto, BMO Field

[Dag Nasty]

My experience was I loved the El Salvador fans. Awesomely respectful in supporting their team but I got a lot of thanks for Canada when I talked to there. Honduras a very different story. Not one as graceful or thankful  as the El Salvador fans.  Just my take and not to be a biggie but I love my time with El Salvador fans than Honduras fans. The win was something but I can get over the 30 H fans I spoke too. Zero appreciation.

In the larger context just want to ask something of people coming here. It is happening but we can do more of the ask. 

Big up for Eric playing for El Salvador and his opportunity. WTF were they thinking making him Cap?  To me and insult to their team. Obviously there are BETTER players and ones that paid the price to play for their team.  In Canada moment you miss a game the lynch mob will be after him like Artfield.  I have no freaking idea why people think that guy owes shit to Canada. HE'S FUCKING SCOTTISH  like much of our team have connections to elsewhere. Should be 100% appreciation a guy who has fuck all connection to Canada. Cheers out to those who chose Canada   Stefan Estackio. HE'S THE MAN. He fits in my palm but pretty sure he'd run around me.  Love it. I am buying his jersey. Owen Hargreaves should never be allowed in Canada yet Artfield didn't play for us today today fuck him. Burn his jersey.  

I love all people who chose Canada and I love all people like me who don't get make Canada, cause in the end they chose Canada. Big ups for Alfie and bigger ups for Alfie for choosing his agent. LOYALTY = HEART.     

Thanks all for my first post. Love Canada and sorry for ruffling feathers.

 

[SthMelbRed]

7 minutes ago, kacbru said:

Well, I live in NZ and there is no doubt I would be supporting Canada in a play-off against the All Whites for the intercontinental play-off.  So I can understand it.

Similarly, I'd be cheering for Les Rouges if we came up against the Socceroos. I do support the Socceroos against all other opposition, though. Then again, I would never cheer for the Australian cricket team, no matter whom they were playing.

Part of that is surely that you and I moved to NZ and Australia, respectively, as adults. You can't just turn off a lifetime of sporting allegiance just like that. You may find that many of those supporting Honduras and El Salvador against Canada in Toronto this week have spent most of their formative years in Canada. That I don't get.

[Miche]

3 hours ago, The Beaver 2.0 said:

We have to start engaging these fans and ask them to come out and cheer with us when we play our mutual enemies. Salvadoran certainly do not need much encouragement to cheer against Mexico, Panama and Honduras, right? And the US.  They don't have to stop cheering for their home countries, but come out and cheer for your adopted country when we are battling the mutual enemy. That should be our tack. Let's start converting the masses.

I absolutely love this. Might not this cycle as the matches are practically simultaneous but I'm sure some would consider it and the seed is planted for the future.

[Unnamed Trialist]

So I'll try a player evaluation, though I tend not to pay attention enough to be able to do this. 

Borjan-handled the few things he was tested on. A leader on the field and the backline is getting comfortable with him.

Vitória-has had some strong games for us. In defense he is quite sure, and did not seem challenged, holding down his space, winning headers. Had a shot on goal with his left foot, what was he doing so high up? On the second goal, perfect execution of the long header from the second post back to Tajon. Quite fit.

Johnston-what can you say, he is a dominant player and has a huge upside. He gets to the challenges over and over again, when he doesn't he holds up his attacker, he is a fairly effective passer going forwards. Rare errors. Solid conditioning. Fine match. The one player I'd love to see move up to a better club, along with Eustáquio.

Miller-a bit more discreet today although his defending was strong. Some here complain about his passing, I personally believe he has limited skills and that passing is just one defect. His positional play is awkward at times. Probably I am evaluating his objective skills, like a scout, and not the game play, which compensates a lot of that. He did not hurt us and played well enough. The weakest player amongst the recent starters.

Eustáquio-today was a balanced day in large part because of how the other mids worked, especially Osorio. Not flashy, more contained, and not as involved: played his role better with two other natural mids. Felt his free kicks are still falling short, not as good as Junior. Still, a major asset.

Atiba-better today than the last start, more sure of himself, and held up well in terms of fitness in our constant swarming press. Drove forwards into the space for the goal, showing what his role is lately for his club as he ages, more an attacking mid who can fall back if need be. 

Osorio-was very technical today, handling tight controls and helping the team move forwards. Did not seem as aggressive defending, but did help a lot in transition  into attack. Good player to have on the pitch when rivals are chirping in Spanish all day to the ref.

Laryea-a rather unusual player, and more so when he was pushed up and was not really playing outside back. Appeared high up quite a bit. Can break down defensives and did so today. Lots of minutes this window, high fitness, challenging in attack. Result: a very nice assist. I am not sure what he is: a back, a mid, a wing? I think none of the above though a bit of all.

Tajon- for me man of the match. Terrorised defenses, and even without getting ahead on speed alone. They keyed him. Scored from the left after spending all that time on the right. Intentional assist, not sure? Has to be smarter on those dirty plays, if you are up 2-0 and get stomped, stay down, let the physios come in,  and then the team needing more time to come back to get a result will reconsider. 

David- I guess this is how he plays. He has ball skills, can hold up, but then had a few plays where he could have been more aggressive in the box. Is what it is, a target and effective scoring.

Junior-very good tonight. Has real football nous and without being fast can control, draw fouls, find teammates. End of a very strong cycle, one of our top players.

Subs:

Not very noticeable, came a bit late I suppose. Piette a bit more useful than Wotherspoon.

 

[SpecialK]

1 hour ago, Dag Nasty said:

My experience was I loved the El Salvador fans. Awesomely respectful in supporting their team but I got a lot of thanks for Canada when I talked to there. Honduras a very different story. Not one as graceful or thankful  as the El Salvador fans.  Just my take and not to be a biggie but I love my time with El Salvador fans than Honduras fans. The win was something but I can get over the 30 H fans I spoke too. Zero appreciation.

In the larger context just want to ask something of people coming here. It is happening but we can do more of the ask. 

Big up for Eric playing for El Salvador and his opportunity. WTF were they thinking making him Cap?  To me and insult to their team. Obviously there are BETTER players and ones that paid the price to play for their team.  In Canada moment you miss a game the lynch mob will be after him like Artfield.  I have no freaking idea why people think that guy owes shit to Canada. HE'S FUCKING SCOTTISH  like much of our team have connections to elsewhere. Should be 100% appreciation a guy who has fuck all connection to Canada. Cheers out to those who chose Canada   Stefan Estackio. HE'S THE MAN. He fits in my palm but pretty sure he'd run around me.  Love it. I am buying his jersey. Owen Hargreaves should never be allowed in Canada yet Artfield didn't play for us today today fuck him. Burn his jersey.  

I love all people who chose Canada and I love all people like me who don't get make Canada, cause in the end they chose Canada. Big ups for Alfie and bigger ups for Alfie for choosing his agent. LOYALTY = HEART.     

Thanks all for my first post. Love Canada and sorry for ruffling feathers.

 

You know Arfield was gonna play in the gold cup but got hurt right, Herdman confirmed it? Also he wanted to play in this window but herdman didn’t call him up. Plus we will probably see him in the October window. Before you rip a player who has to played for Canada 19 times ( a bunch of times in key matches) and was basically the man of match vs the USA win who is 32 years older with a very young family and has been getting hurt lately because of the ton of football he has been playing. 
Sometimes I wonder what’s wrong with Canadian fans sometimes. 

[SpecialK]

What an amazing game. I hope we can find away to play like that with Davies. Everything doesn’t have to go through Davies. Canada tonight looked amazing. Much more balanced in the attack. 
 

Mad love for Davies ! I wish he was there ! It’s just tonight game finally confirms it we force the game to Davies way too much, in my view during this window.  We gonna find a way to balance the attack with him. 

Edited September 9, 2021 by SpecialK

[Buchta]

3 hours ago, vancanman said:

  I don't understand how anyone can cheer against the country where they live, that's giving them a job, a house, an education for their kids, and usually a better life.

I can give an example of Canadians who live abroad and hockey.  If Canada is playing in the Czech Republic (for example) they will almost always cheer for Canada, and not the country where they live, have a job etc.  

[TGAA_Star]

2 hours ago, admin said:

Join the Voyageurs, get priority access to tickets.

Okay how do I go about that?

[TGAA_Star]

11 hours ago, Strait Red said:

It’s at BMO, it was announced a while back 

Then of course yes I'm tryin to get tickets 

[TGAA_Star]

But seeing yesterday's match I couldn't help but be impressed by yesterday's performance. It basically was a must win game for us heading into the break because now it doesn't get any easier in October especially when we face Mexico away, Jamaica away and Panama at home. 5 points through three games is respectable.

[Miche]

4 minutes ago, TGAA_Star said:

Okay how do I go about that?

https://www.thevoyageurs.org/

https://www.thevoyageurs.org/store/product/27-voyageurs-canada-1-year/

[WestHamCanadianinOxford]

4 hours ago, vancanman said:

I don't understand how anyone can cheer against the country where they live, that's giving them a job, a house, an education for their kids, and usually a better life.

You probably would need to shield your eyes/ears if you were in  my house when the Canada/GB women's game was on this summer. To cite the most recent example.

[Gian-Luca]

6 hours ago, The Beaver 2.0 said:

We have to start engaging these fans and ask them to come out and cheer with us when we play our mutual enemies. Salvadoran certainly do not need much encouragement to cheer against Mexico, Panama and Honduras, right? And the US.  They don't have to stop cheering for their home countries, but come out and cheer for your adopted country when we are battling the mutual enemy. That should be our tack. Let's start converting the masses.

Or we just need to stop selling tickets to people with a US address as I am pretty sure that is where most, if not all the Honduran fans were from (wasn’t at the game last night but signs are pointing to many ES fans being from out of country as well).

[narduch]

Borjan was not happy with all the blue in the stadium.

[BigMo]

6 hours ago, SthMelbRed said:

I'm not sure that the Salvadorans would necessarily cheer for Canada against Honduras or Panama. The Latinos that I knew growing up in North Burnaby would rep any Central American country over Canada regardless of their own country of origin. In the case of my neighbourhood, they were mostly Salvadoran or Chilean.

I’m not Latino, but I know for many African immigrants like my family and family friends, there generally is a passion for football but very little awareness of the NTs WC chances. I think extended success would change the overall attitude towards Canadian soccer in many communities, everyone loves a winner. 
 

 

[Olympique_de_Marseille]

11 hours ago, El Hombre said:

Almost looks like a well worked set piece, don't you think @Olympique_de_Marseille?

We can count that one as a successful set piece; we still had 3 unsuccessful corner kicks though.

[Approve My Account Pls]

Just some next morning thoughts. Although having the crowd be 50/50 was tough, I will say in a way I almost preferred having it be 100% engaged fans as opposed to that other 50% being casuals with no passion for the game. That El Salvador anthem was very cool to see and I think made the rest of us sing louder for the Canadian anthem. I do think a lot of these same fans will turn up in red next time because they are football fans first (ie the guy in front of me with the El Salvador jersey and the tattoo sleeve with a giant maple leaf in the middle). 

That being said, I do think there's a role that the V's and other fans need to play to try and be more engaging and less niche to try and attract the average Canadian to the games. I'm not sure what that would look like, but sometimes it feels like people on here can be gatekeepers rather than welcoming to the bandwagoners, which are the people we need to pack our stadiums.

 

Edit: one additional point I noticed attending both home matches: these boys ride for one another. Any hard foul, not only do the players on the field back their boy, but the bench is immediately on the sideline. May be a small detail, but I absolutely love to see it. Surprisingly, for his minimal contribution, Wotherspoon seems to be one of the first to the sideline every time.

Edited September 9, 2021 by Approve My Account Pls

[Metro]

1 hour ago, Gian-Luca said:

Or we just need to stop selling tickets to people with a US address as I am pretty sure that is where most, if not all the Honduran fans were from (wasn’t at the game last night but signs are pointing to many ES fans being from out of country as well).

I think in the past the CSA would have rejected this outright because they may have wanted to sell as many tickets as possible to help with the bottom line.  I hope they would be more willing to consider this nowadays.

[Admin]

Just now, Metro said:

I think in the past the CSA would have rejected this outright because they may have wanted to sell as many tickets as possible to help with the bottom line.  I hope they would be more willing to consider this nowadays.

Tickets to the game in Vancouver vs Mexico were geo blocked.

 

[BrennanFan]

Dominant and deserved win.

However. 

This was El Salvador and we have had their number for a few years now when playing at home, so more of an expected result than a step up in my view. 

Removing Larin and adding Osorio in the middle had a huge impact on our ability to combine and make plays. David felt more dangerous and paired well with Tajon up top in the second half. Larin and David are just too similar and Herdman is going to have a tough decision having to sit a excellent forward in the next games. 

On to the next one. 

[Admin]

People are grossly overestimating the number of El Salvador fans at this game.  They were not 2/3 of the crowd. That is absurd.   They did buy the most expensive seats. 

The % for the Jamaica game in 2008 keeps creeping up. In the future there will be people saying it was 100% Jamaican. 

 

[theaub]

7 hours ago, Olympique_de_Marseille said:

I tried to convert people post game. Many were receptive.

Same here.  Ended up chatting to a few who flew in from Edmonton who were ready to buy tickets to the November matches if they were on sale already.   

[BrennanFan]

Another thing, where I was (123), Canadian fans were few and far between, surrounded by El Salvadorans, but it was amazing and cathartic seeing their energy fade away. Loved celebrating in their faces! 

There were a few chants where the Canadian contingent in the section really joined the south end and got loud, especially the 'This Is Our House'. The south end led the way and was loud all game, very proud, well done. 

Loved the Jarrek sign. Respect. 

[Admin]

Any good photos of the flags being up in the south end?

[grigorio]

10 minutes ago, BrennanFan said:

Loved the Jarrek sign. Respect. 

What was that banner about?