We were always going to lose against Mexico but they could have made a difference against Haiti and Honduras. Guys like Choiniere and Borges played 90 minutes in CONCACAF League against top clubs from those countries- they know how to grind it out for 90 minutes. Yes MLS guys are in a higher environment but they aren't playing those type of games, in those type of environment against those type of teams. Others simply play way more minutes. I'm just saying we have to stop with MLS is better = select all of them. Biello had a bias and that's fine, but Bair / Tabla/ Raposo could have been replaced by CPL guys. David Norman Jr didn't play much in 2020 but he was clocking heavy minutes with Pacific in CPL 2019. Buchanan, Baldisimo, Metcalfe deserved to be there with the fullbacks... outside of that, I have questions about Biello selection.
I'm not advocating that switching some CPL players for other CPL players would have changed the result here. It wouldn't. Would I have tinkered with the roster? Probably. But that's beside the point. I don't think that Borges and Choiniere changes the game for us against Haiti and Honduras, even if I likely would have called them. The tactics likely would have still been the same from the manager. I thought those tactics were often disappointing. Look at the quality of many of the offensive players we put on the field for the tournament, it wasn't good enough, in my opinion. Aiden Daniels? Brym? Where we need to get to, as a nation, eventually, is a manager able to select players who have lots of pro experience and play week in and week out (not withstanding these tournaments are always in our off season, it is what it is). Obviously we still have to increase the quality of our players. I'm hopeful when I hear TFC brass say they are going to actually play the academy graduates this year. Still skeptical, but hopeful. I also have a lot of hope for the academy graduates that the Impact signed at the end of last season. The fact remains that the majority of our players on this team, don't regularly play at the club level. Obviously that's detrimental to our qualifying attempts. That's what the CPL and everyone in Canadian soccer are trying to fix.
I agree with this statement. For the sake of discussion, aside from the CPL, what would you propose to fix this?
Obviously better coaching and more professional opportunities are the answer in this country. It's a broad answer, but the only answer. Hopefully in 4 years we can rely on players who are have regular starters in CPL for years and some who have used the CPL to launch their career and are playing elsewhere.