We held a u17 boys national team camp this week. I never thought I’d see the day we could afford to do that again.
That's great news. I'm looking forward to the CONCACAF U17 Championships in February. The US and the Canada are set up to match up again!!! Its seems we've been meeting a lot at youth events recently. Three of four teams advance from the group stage..............so that group result kinda doesn't matter. All it'll take to advance is beating Barbados. The US has had ups and downs in youth cycles (Missing out on U17 and U20 WCs. The U23 level was an utter failure cycle after cycle), and the US has had ups and downs with the senior team too. Its meant to be a rollercoaster. Just gotta keep investing and plugging away at the youth levels and development. Keep building and building and building depth. You can never have enough depth. [Its like............you can never have enough pitching in baseball.] We see that with France. They have an insane squad of players that missed the WC due to injury. Now they have a bunch of players ill in their WC camp. They keep plugging in new guys and advancing. Argentina completely turned over their squad after their first game. Plugged in the new guys, and found plan B. That's really the difference between those nations and the North American nations. The quality depth. Not just depth. Quality depth. France loses Pogba, Kante, and other midfielders? Ho hum. They just start 20 year old Tchouameni of Real Madrid. Ho hum. Last game I don't think they used 20 year old Camavinga, also of Real Madrid. The gap is so wide between what they're doing and what we're doing. Its why I say that getting to this 2nd tier has been hard for Canada, but the journey to breaking the top 10 is even harder. It could take 50 years. Cuz, you need ANOTHER Alphonso Davies and ANOTHER Jonathan David and ANOTHER Eustaquio to break thru to them. And maybe one isn't enough. And maybe they're not even good enough. Cuz Jonathan David ain't Kylian Mbappe. And you can't have holes. They will be ruthlessly exposed by the likes of Croatia. Croatia looked offensively beyond anemic in this tournament, except against Canada. They scored 4 goals against Canada. In their other 4 games they scored a total of 2 goals............. I still can't get over Herdman's tactics in that Croatia game. it should haunt CSA leadership. That was a masterclass in getting it wrong.
Unfortunately, Canada went the opposite way in the FIFA rankings. Not that it matters, but Canada and Qatar were the biggest rankings losers. Canada supposedly dropped 12 spots to #53. The USMNT is ranked No. 13 in the latest FIFA World Rankings 👀 pic.twitter.com/y7vVGPGNI3— USMNT Only (@usmntonly) December 20, 2022
Well at least for this cycle it won’t matter a ton as they’ll get seeded in Pot A for the next World Cup. Basically they have 8 years to work on their FIFA ranking.
They should safely be tucked in as the 4th CONCACAF team after the US, Mexico, and CR. Barring a disaster in the Nations League this spring, that should put them into a seeded position for the 2023 Gold Cup (which is the top 4 teams). Canada have only won 3 of their last 10 games. And two of those were against Curacao and Qatar. Qatar being the other big faller after the World Cup in the rankings. So they haven't exactly been racking up points. If we care about that sort of thing. Canadians know these types of things matter. Your chances of being put into a wicked "group of death" for the Gold Cup increases if you're not the seeded. The 2026 WC seeds will be determined 3.5 years from now. So long way to go before we worry about that. Just on a positive note, they were #94 as calendar year 2018 started. So they've moved up 40 slots during that time. Overall.............a good story.
I don't know why. There's going to be somewhere between 12 and 16 groups instead of the usual 8. The extra #1 seeds means there'll be less room for complaint.
The most relevant impact of their ranking in the short term is that it makes English work permits much harder to get for their MLS based players. If you're in the top 50 and play 70 percent of more of your team's games you automatically get a work permit. And you need 60 percent for top 30, 40 percent for top 20, and 30 percent for top 10. When you're outside of the top 50 you're basically in Andre Blake territory where is very very difficult to qualify coming from MLS or a lesser European league (anything below the top 5, Portugal, the Netherlands, Turkey, Belgium, and Scotland).
We'll never know. Going into the event, one thought the groups were pretty similar. By the way, Wales and Belgium were drawn together in the Nations League. 1-1 in Cardiff, 2-1 in Brussels. Very tight, just like the Belgians game with Canada. I think people forget that the Welsh have had some good results since the reopening from COVID. Heck, they beat Mexico in 2021. Iran was the highest ranked Asian team at the event. Not Japan or South Korea. Good win for the USMNT. Morocco was the 2nd highest-ranked African team after the Mane-less Senegal. People act like Morocco playing well was a surprise. Prior to the World Cup, they'd lost 2 of their last 37 matches! And one was in extra time (Egypt in the AFCON QF). The only nation to beat Morocco outright since the start of 2020 (since the reopening from COVID) had been the USMNT. 3-0 blowout this past June. A total outlier. [I get that we weren't expecting Morocco to beat Spain, Portugal, and Belgium. The #2, #7, and #9 ranked teams in the world. I think people were underestimating them, though.] Belgium #2 Croatia #12 Morocco #22 Canada #41 England #5 USMNT #16 Wales #19 Iran #20
The Morocco we beat was missing Ziyech, Mazraoui, Boufal, and several other starters, though. We were missing Dest and McKennie could only play about 20 minutes.
How did a World Cup star end up homeless on the streets of London? The extraordinary tale of Welsh footballer Paul James - who played for Canada at Mexico 86
This offseason in the CPL has reinforced that the soccer pyramid in Canada is working (of course, with obvious room for expansion/improvement) Players have moved on to Europe: Marco Bustos - Sweden top division, Dominc Zator - Poland top division, Julian Roloff to the German top division, Ronan Kratt moved to Werder Bremen Players are training/trailing with European clubs: 3 Vancouver players with a club in the English Championship, Kwasi Poku is with Swedish champion BK Hacken, Ollie Bassett and Nathan Ingham are at Ateltico San Luis in Mexico, Rayane Yesli is with AC Ajaccio of Ligue 1 in France. Daniel Krutzen is on trial with the Whitecaps. Lots of quality young players from League1 Ontario have transferred to CPL clubs. This week an u17 national team prospect from a League1 Ontario club reserve side joined 2 Bundesliga side Kalsruher. Talented League1 Ontario coach Patrice Ghesier was recently named head coach of Hfx Wanderers. It's important that our coaches get these opportunities to advance in the game, as well as players. League1 BC was established last year, joining League1 Ontario and Quebec. News has just come out that League1 Alberta looks promising to begin in 2024. It seems likely that a team from Kelowna BC will join in 2024. It's vital a club from Quebec join the league soon. That would make 10 teams. This all may seem unremarkable for people from other countries with established professional soccer infrastructure. However, in Canada, this pyramid didn't exist 5 years ago. I couldn't have fathomed any of this when Canada was in the soccer wilderness for all of those years.
Multiple English Championship clubs have enquired to Troyes for Ike Ugbo who could leave the club in the next days 🇨🇦 #transfersExpect player back in England by end of the window. pic.twitter.com/97nHsPW51F— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) January 23, 2023
Another Canadian in the top 5 - Cyle Larin joins Real Valladolid in La Liga ✍️ We are delighted to announce the signing of striker Cyle Larin. #CyleLarinBlanquivioleta pic.twitter.com/OsaDQZinua— Real Valladolid CF 🇬🇧🇺🇸🇨🇦 💜 (@realvalladolidE) January 24, 2023
That's a signing to try to help avoid relegation. Valladolid is in terrible form. They've only scored 13 goals all season, so they need him. Hopefully he has a relegation release clause.
I should have clarified that he's being loaned by Club Brugge with an option to buy. He could end up staying with the club in La Liga if he delivers or would go back to Belgium
It's also a move in search of playing time as he's only started 2 of 20 total games for Brugge this year.
Atletico Ottawa Ballou Tabla transfers to Turkey with D2 club Manisa FK Atlético Ottawa and Manisa FK have reached an agreement for the transfer of Ballou Tabla. Thank you / Merci Ballou!🔴 ⚪Read more: https://t.co/wsRTqcZquw#ForOttawa I #PourOttawa pic.twitter.com/TVm29ekrCt— Atlético Ottawa (@atletiOttawa) January 25, 2023 🤝 Ailemize Hoş Geldin Ballou Tabla ✍️ pic.twitter.com/9f6oDYp8ky— Manisa Futbol Kulübü (@ManisaFK) January 25, 2023
We win it for our clubs! Cyle Larin scores in his 1st game in La Liga Larin with the winner in his Valladolid debut! #CANMNT pic.twitter.com/mNAOfvnw1X— 𝕲𝖑𝖆𝖘𝖘𝕮𝖎𝖙𝖞 (@GlassCityFC) January 29, 2023 Stephen Eustaquio and Porto wins the League cup Stephen Eustaquio 🇨🇦 scores an incredible goal from outside the box 😱 #CanMNT #FCPortopic.twitter.com/UASPqeJsQR— Giuseppe Campanelli (@giuseppecam22) January 28, 2023
I would not be surprised if Mexico slips to clearly the 3rd best team in CONCACAF next cycle. They have an old team and it’s not clear the next generation is ready to replace them.