NextPod Soccer Podcast for November 21

In today's NextPod, James and Duane lament another oh-for World Cup for Canada after the u17s lose against Mali and then talk to Ben Steiner of CB Sports about the 2023 USports men's and women's championship weekend.

Episode Transcript

(00:04):
Welcome to next part, your weeklylook at North American soccer prospects and the
West. Next bro Campiel and beyond. These are your homes, Dwayne Road
and James Grossi, and welcome tonext pot. I'm Dwayne Rowlands. Joining

(00:28):
me on the line. Is notmy cat, but my cat is beside
me, So if you hear mehow, it's not James. James Grossi,
how are you doing. I've beenknown to me how from time to
time, but it's it's a prettyrare occurrence, so yeah, I will
definitely be the cat. I'm doingall right, Duane. It's been a
you know, another busy, busyweek of Canadian soccer. I was up

(00:49):
at four am on Wednesday to watchthe U seventeens play their final match at
the World Cup, which was disappointing, but we'll talk about that a little
bit more. Caught up on alittle bit street of sleep. I needed
needed a nap after that one.But I'm doing well and looking forward to
chatting about all things Canadian development footballwith the Today. Yeah, there is

(01:11):
certainly a lot going on in Canadiansoccer, James. There always is.
Do we have an off season?We don't really seem to have an off
season, but we're gonna have anoff season on the show. That's gonna
start after the December fourth edition ofthis this podcast. We're not going away
permanently, low just for a monthto recharge, do some stuff set up
things like Patreon Wink wink, nudgenudge and things like that. But James,

(01:32):
before we do that, we havethree more shows, including today and
today We've got a great guest inBen stein Er from CBC Sports. He's
an associate professor there also does fortynine Sports, which covers the U sports
game in Canada, the university sportsgame. He's gonna talk to us about
the men's and women's national championship tournamentsthat took place this past weekend. Right
after this quick break and welcome back. Ben Stutter joins us. Joins us

(02:10):
on the line. He's with CBCSports, sociate producer. There also forty
nine Sports website. He runs.There a big into the university game in
this country. He was at thenational championships in Kingston this weekend and the
women. How you doing, Ben, I'm doing well and I know we
spoke about U Sports at the startof the season, so definitely nice to
be back at the end of theseason. It's a good book end and

(02:31):
a lot of soccer to get throughthis fall and we're near the end of
it now, but soon enough it'llbe time to start it back up again.
That's what I love about the sport. It never ends. Two winners.
We had a Lavelle or sorry,Cape Breton winning on the on the
men's side, YOUBC. On thewomen's side, YOUBC. That's a record
winning performance for them. In termsof all time Cape Bretton's a program I
talked about last week that I reallyhave a lot of time for. So

(02:53):
overall ben worthy champions. Yeah,I think it's worthy champions in boast.
I mean, the only one thatyou can kind of look at in a
way is Cape Breton because in termsof tournament spot allotment for each of the
conferences, they didn't actually qualify ontheir own because they didn't win the AUS
this year, and so you couldsay, you know that they weren't they're

(03:16):
on their own own merit, butthey managed to deliver at the national championships,
So I guess you could have somequalms with with them going all the
way and it's the second straight yearwhere a team that didn't qualify on their
own merits has won the tournament.Of course, Thompson Rivers winning last year
as hosts, so you could havesome arguments there, but overall, I

(03:38):
think Cape bretton what they've established overthe last several years under Deno Morley and
what they were able to do thisyear outside of you know, just falling
apart in the AUS final really againstSaint FX. Worthy winners. They deserve
to be there, and just interms of the way the Spots would have
found their way out, they wouldthey wouldn't have found their way in if
we're in another location. Certainly Worthywinners in terms of their actual football.

(04:03):
And then you know, home fieldadvantage in these kind of competitions, these
sort of tournament settings always play sucha big factor. So yeah, you
sort of expect to see the teamthat's playing on their own field get a
little bit of a leg up.But it was a lot of football over
the four days of the competition.I was really grateful that the CBC were
broadcasting those games, whether it wason JAM or on YouTube. I had

(04:26):
it on in the background all weekendlong on one of the many many screens
I have in my office right now. I know it was probably too much
football to sort of encapsulate right now, but maybe if you could just list
off some of the highlights for youor any sort of surprises or really big
moments that you think people should knowabout. Yeah, I mean it was

(04:46):
quite the weekend. I don't knowwhether many of the results were necessarily shocking
in a way. I mean youcan look at maybe the Queen's Gails not
making it through the first round aftera good OUA season and their disappointment against
Trinny Western, But then again,sure any Western deserved winners there, and
they impressed me all weekend. Andin the men's tournament, you know UBC
in Montreal, it's a coin flipin the semi final and Montreal finds their

(05:10):
way through. I thought UBC hasa lot of but both teams have a
lot of CPL prospects, and Iknow we'll get into that, but I
mean a lot of the games thatthe National Championships are are coin flips.
I'd say maybe the most surprising thingis is saying ef X didn't manage to
get themselves a goal at the tournamentafter being quite good all season. Yes,

(05:31):
they were playing in a woman's AUSdivision that is a lot less strong
than a lot of the rest ofthe country. But I still thought,
you know, they could nab agoal either in that first round or in
the Constellation bracket. But even thoughAmanda Smith scores twenty two in the regular
season against a US competition, shecouldn't find one at national Championships to wrap
up her career. Maybe maybe anothersurprise from the women's tournament is the final

(05:56):
didn't go to penalty kicks. Ithought it was destined there. I was
standing behind the Triney Western goal inthe final, and I thought that first
of all, it was gonna goto penalty kicks and then share Sofi Crowther
steps up to take a corner kickin one hundred and eighteenth and their coach,
Graham Roxburg is saying, take afew more steps back and try and

(06:16):
curl this in, and I'm like, no way, We're not gonna have
another final in Canada. Decide byan Olympico. That's how the bronze medal
game was decided, as well as, of course the CPL Final two.
I was like, this isn't gonnahappen again. I have it. She
floats it into the box, UBCgoes down the other way. One hundred
nineteenth minute winner from Cattle in Tolney. So yeah, I mean, maybe
that game was a bit surprising thatit didn't go to penalty kicks, but

(06:40):
in terms of actual results, Idon't think nothing was too shocking. Just
what we need, another Olympic gamewinner. I caught that one in the
semifinal as well, a pretty spectacularmoment. And yeah, I think the
standout thing for me was that theseating didn't really seem to matter very much.
It didn't matter whether it was aone v eight or a two v
seven a type situation. The teamswere going for it and anybody could win

(07:03):
in these days. You sort ofpreempted my next question there with your cpl
U Sports mentioned. I wanted tosee if there were any players that caught
your eye and maybe made a namefor themselves and deserve that opportunity on a
bigger stage. We know the USports Draft is coming up pretty soon in
the next little while, so whowould you like to see be given an

(07:24):
opportunity there. I mean, firstof all, I'll just touch on one
thing that you mentioned is the seating. It has to be like refigured in
some way, because you know,UBC was number one in the country on
the weekly rankings for sixteen straight weeks. Yet they come into the national tournament
ranked seventh of the eighteenth eight teamsbecause they lost the Canada West Final on

(07:46):
penalty kicks, and so you know, they're not an underdog story in any
way, and neither is kpe Breton, and so yeah, I the seating
has to be reworked in some way. But I could go on forever about
that. But in terms of CPLprospects, there's a lot of options,
and I think what it's going tocome down to is whether guys want to

(08:07):
play in the CPL. To behonest, I know there's some players that
have been picked in the past andsome players that could be picked this year
that you know, professional soccer isnot going to pay you very much if
you're playing in the CPL, andthey don't necessarily have the potential to get
higher than the CPL. For alot of the time, coming out of
the U Sports Draft after playing atU Sports season, I think you can

(08:31):
take a look at some of thetop scores you see, like Chris Campoli,
he's been there before. He's beenpicked three times. From what I've
heard, he doesn't even want toplay in the league because you know,
he's graduated this year from Toronto MetropolitanUniversity with a master's of Business administration,
so you know that's going to payyou more. If you can find a
job in that field, then theCPL would say with Omar Marjuka Ontario Tech

(08:56):
Sebastian Zakowski is interesting. He ledthe league, led the nation in goal
scoring this year with fifteen goals withUBC. He's only completed three years of
his eligibility, but he doesn't planon coming back to UBC, so there
could be the potential there. ButI wouldn't also be surprised if you know
by him already saying that he's notcoming back, whether he has something lined

(09:20):
up professionally. Otherwise. My thinkinggoes to some of the younger players,
in particular, I would love tosee what Luke Norman could do in the
CPL. A first year coming outof UBC, was exceptional at Nationals,
scored a wonder goal in the bronzemedal game, and I think he could

(09:41):
make an impact as one of thoseyounger players that comes in on a summer
deal and then probably goes back toschool. Javier Sigaste from Victoria. He's
been around for a while now butwas one of the top playmakers in U
sports. This season has been oneof the top playmakers and a bit of
a mix between you know, aten and as six but not quite an

(10:01):
eight. And then another name that'sthat's certainly intriguing is Tyler Otarto. CPL
fans will recognize that name from hisdays with valor As once upon a time
the youngest player in the CPL.Of course dj Taheed crossing that one off
uh pretty severely, but Atarto didwell with your York lines this year impressed

(10:26):
me in a fairly similar system tohow York United has approached the last few
years. So I could see themtaking a punt on on Atato. And
yeah, those names I've mentioned arekind of the ones that stand out.
In terms of goalkeeping. Dino bantisUh and In Dumelin could be sort of
your your top choices there both youngkeepers who impressed Dumelin with with Mount Royal

(10:50):
basically carried them to the National Championshiptournament into their first Canada West title,
and then Deno Bantis was impressive withWestern as well, so I could see
him getting a chance in a course. He's the son of former Canada Soccer
president Nick Bontes. It was aboutto say, we know that last name.
Putting aside the money situation, weall understand that the campl ideally would

(11:11):
need to offer some bigger salaries toattract folks, particularly folks with NBAS.
They might as well drop them intorun a team rather than play for the
team, right, But we allunderstand that that's going to be an issue
and it will probably be an issuewhen Project gets going. We're going to
say when, not actual, okay, but speaking of Project date, from
what you've seen in the women's game, do you think there is enough talent

(11:31):
in the university game and just sortof at that level to sort of see
the women's program or what would weneed to look at ways to bring a
greater amount of players in from elsewhereto get that league off the ground.
It's an interesting question because I thinkyou have enough Canadian talent to play in
the league, and that's discounting.You know that those within the national team

(11:54):
picture, those who should be playingin Europe, and within those those top
tier one leagues. So I'm notsaying, you know, Julia Gross is
going to come back and play forthe vakroy Caps Project eight team, Like,
I don't think that's the way togo, even though I know that
they're ideally carving out a role forone national team player on each team.

(12:15):
But in terms of the talent thatwould make up most league, based on
the university game in Canada, thetop programs do with the national championships,
most of those players you could probablyput in a professional league and call it
fine, you know, from theMontreals of the world, Laval's UBC's training
Western saying facts even although maybe alittle bit more fringe, like you're you

(12:37):
have enough quality there. But Ithink in terms of to build an actual
competitive place for women to really thriveand take that next step, it has
to be a mix of you know, if you're going to use mostly U
sports players, then you have tobe incorporating in Canada's top NCAA players.
You have to be incorporating the girlsfrom SFU that made the n Cuba A

(13:01):
D two tournament this year and alot of them played League one BC,
and you have to be incorporating playerslike Sadie sider Reckenberg who didn't quite go
the way that she wanted uh inin France and she's back in the NC
Double A, and you know,maybe she's the type of person that you
can involved in Project Date. NiFleming Thompson played with you know, Vonazouri

(13:24):
York Lions for a year and thenwent to the n C Double A as
well, Like those are the playersthat you're gonna have to involve to raise
that level because U sports level isnot going to be enough even if it
is that you know, top level, and so you have to find a
happy medium between there between incorporating alot of people who played collegiately in Canada
because I think that's the system thatneeds that opportunity, but then also making

(13:48):
sure that you can provide that professionalopportunity to the Canadians and the tons of
Canadians that have gone south to then C Double A. And you were
you were in Kingston and you knowyou can project You know, you spoke
with a bunch of these athletes overthe weekend, you were around the soccer
all weekend long. Was was thatpossibility on the minds of some of these

(14:09):
young women and maybe just In additionto that, what was it like being
being in Kingston for a weekend ofso much soccer and you know a little
bit of a festival of soccer thatyou know maybe doesn't get as much attention
as we all would like it to. Yeah, the Project Date one was
was definitely a topic. I rememberlast year after finishing Nationals in Quebec City,

(14:31):
Megan Sovey won the national MVP forthe Montreal Caraban and we talked after
with goldenll around her neck, USports Trophy in her hands, we were
chatting about how there's there's you know, no future in the domestic game in
Canada. Of course that was beforeProject Date was announced, just you know,
a couple of months before the announcementcame out. And she's gone over

(14:52):
to Italy to play there, andand she has a professional career underway and
is doing you know fine from thatfront because she was good enough and had
the opportunity to go overseas and youknow, was fortunate enough that she she
could take that chance. Of course, that opportunity isn't there for everybody.
But this year, after the finalGolden Miller around her neck, I speak

(15:13):
to UBC first year Bailey Dorkson,who hadn't played since the Canada West semi
final, was thrown into the USports Final to make an impact in the
thirtieth minute and and she did.It was you know, her second touch,
she got a shot off and nearlyfound the back of the net in
a game that was really stingy rightfrom the start to the end. And

(15:33):
you know, she was positive aboutit. She was starstruck by Diana Maths
and being at the Esports Awards beforethe tournament, and she's positive that,
you know, Project eight will bethere when she graduates, and that's something
that she has her eye on asa player that sort of projects to be
able to go professionally based on onwhere she's being through the youth level and

(15:54):
how she settled it in her rookieyear. So it's it's definitely something that
that people are looking at. ButDwayne is, as you mentioned, the
financial part is also there because youknow, you talk to some of the
athletes and there's not many people whoare are interested in prolonging their soccer career
and postponing their professional career because themoney is not necessarily there in Canada,

(16:18):
let alone in the women's game globally. Like I chatted with Cattle and Tolney,
the National player of the year,one of the best players I think
to ever play the university women's gamein Canada, and she's done, Like,
she doesn't plan on continuing to playanymore. The UBC League One team,
not smot FC is has folded andso that opportunity isn't necessarily there anymore

(16:42):
unless she wants to go play foranother League one team, you know,
just to keep active really in thesummer, keep sharp. But she's already
working full time. She was onlydoing a couple of courses at UBC and
so she was a student and stillfully eligible and she's sill has a year
of eligibility if she wanted to,but she doesn't have thoughts of you know,

(17:04):
going overseas to test a professional career, and who knows, maybe she's
a year too late for project dates. So that's definitely a heartbreaking theme that
we've seen, you know, overthe last generations for women's soccer players in
Canada, and hopefully that changes andcertainly a bit of positivity speaking with Bailey
Dorkson about that and Sophie Crowther fromTrindy Western in much the same realm,

(17:30):
but in terms of being there fora tournament in Kingston, I wasn't so
keen on the host location in thefirst place, just because I think if
you host you sports tournament in asmaller locale where people have to travel for
the tournament, you're not going toreally get get people out for it,
and that unfortunately proved true. Thereweren't a ton of people other than parents

(17:56):
and siblings who were at the finalor really throughout the games. May be
a few more at the Queen's TurneyWestern game on the first day, but
of course Queens doesn't get through andthat stadium. It's a great facility and
the athletic department does what they canwith it, but unfortunately the geographic location
of it is just so far awayfrom the main Queen's campus that you're not

(18:18):
necessarily getting that crowd out in thesame way that you could if it was
on that main campus and you madeit a bit more of an event on
main campus towards a large student bodyand a student body that enjoys events.
And so next year will be interestingin terms of the men's tournament being an
Oshawa at Ontario Tech and the women'stournament at Dalhousie. I don't love the

(18:41):
locations of the hosts just given theavailable facilities for both, they don't really
seem up to national standard for me. But it's gonna be a balancing act.
You need people to host these thesetournaments. In terms of being there,
it's kind of what you make ofit. I'm often the only porter
there, me and you know,coaches for the most part of the only

(19:04):
people watching the games in the pressbox, and whoever the sports info guy
is tracking the game. I thinkI'm the only person on the live stats
link. I'm you know, ifit wasn't for me there, you probably
only see the live streams. Andthat's about it. And that's great that
the live streams are there, butyou know, it's just that that greater

(19:26):
picture of college sports coveraging candidate isnot is not too too rich in a
lot of ways. So it's whatyou make of it. I try and
make the most of it, butit, you know, it could be
a lonely experience if you don't sortof embrace a little bit. I hear
you. I've I've been in fartoo many under attended press boxes over the

(19:51):
years, so I emphasize with thatsituation, and I do really appreciate the
work you guys do at Fortunite Sportsto shine some light on all of it.
What you said about about the projectdate possibly coming too late, that
the timing of things, it runga bell with so many conversations that I've
had with guys over the years whereit's you know, players who started off

(20:12):
with the CPL in their first yearand then decided to retire and move onto
their business lives, or you knowguys who come through the TFC system and
CMLs next pro and wish that somethinglike that had existed when they were a
little bit younger. We have somuch catching up to do in this country,
and you're always going to to Nomatter how much forward progress would make,

(20:34):
there's still whether it's financially, whetherit's opportunity wise, there's still going
to be so much more grand tomake up. So I thought that that
struck a chord with so many conversationsI've had over the years. As you
mentioned, we chatted at the beginningof the year. We're touching base now
to book end the season, butI was hoping we could look back to
before these two championships and just sortof point out whether were there any storylines

(20:57):
emerging from the regular seasons that youthought people should know about, any programs
that made big strides forward or anythat had no tougher seasons than you expected.
I thought the University Saskatchewan Huskies inCanada West women's soccer were outstanding this
year. They just seemed to committo the way that they were looking to

(21:19):
play and their approach to you know, it wasn't necessarily entertaining football when they
played some of the bigger programs inCanada West, but they managed to have
a goal here off a defensive mistake, or just play in a low to
mid block for the entire game andfind their way through and find their way

(21:40):
to some sort of result. Andthey missed out on the national championship by
one game. It was a competitivegame against UBC, and they felt the
eventual national champions to miss out onthe national championship, so I mean,
if you're gonna lose to anybody,you might as well lose to the top
team. And so yeah, Ithought that they're a program that's definitely someone
to to look at in years tocome, as well as the Ontario Tech

(22:03):
men's soccer program really took steps thisyear, albeit without Chris Campoli. I
think that's a program to really watch, especially going into next year where they
are national's hosts and all they haveto do to win the national championship is
win three games. Ben Steiner fromCBC Sports the forty nine Sports, I

(22:25):
appreciate the work you do on theU sports side. That was where I
got my start writing about sports.Talking about sports way back when, almost
twenty years ago. Now making meold when I think about that, But
I guess that's not making me old. I just am old anyway. Ben,
Thanks thanks for taking some time.No, well, thank you having
me and welcome back, and thanksagain to Ben for taking some time.

(22:56):
James, one thing that really jumpedout. I mean, first, let's
congratulate YOUBC in Cape Bretton again,two very deserving programs. I don't think
anyone can argue with that. ButI was taken a back a little bit
by the comments. But the womenthat sort of were indicating that they might
not be all that interested in projectright now. There were some that said
that they were clearly but you know, you're talking about the you know,

(23:18):
the best player in the League sortof saying nah, I don't know,
I might pass on that, Andthat really struck me James as a roadblock
that they're going to have to overcome, and it might be a roadblock that
is more difficult to overcome and thewomen's side of the game than it might
even be in the men's side ofthe game for reasons that I can't fully
articulate. I don't think, ormaybe have to carefully articulate even but that

(23:41):
might really be there, that itmight be there might be more resistance because
it's just not culturally part of theway that women athletes think, because they
haven't been given the opportunity in thepast before to think about turning prot at
a lower level and working their wayup, and they may not see a
long term benefit to doing it anyway. And if you're turning down a salary
of I don't know, one hundredthousand dollars to start, if you have

(24:02):
an advanced degree maybe and you're livingin a big city and you need to
make ends meet and you have somedebts to pay back, I can understand
how that might not be appealing tothem, and that might be a real
roadblock to getting Project aid off andgoing James, Well, yeah, yeah,
I mean it's it's a it's afairly common story, you know.
It's it's not that odd that wehear of, you know, somebody who

(24:27):
gets drafted in the MLS Super Draftbut decides that their you know, computer
science degree from Stanford is worth alittle bit more than that rookie contract is
going to end up paying them out. Over those couple of years, we've
seen a raft of retirements from theCPL of guys who you thought could have
played, could have played at agood level for another couple of years,
but decided that their time was betterspent, you know, doing other things.

(24:48):
And for me, the the ideaof creating a pathway for players to
chase this dream and for players tohave that dream past in food space for
the fact that, you know,maybe sometimes those people that are the most
talented, they're going to choose thattheir life's journey is going to take them
somewhere else. So I don't thinkit's going to be I don't think it's

(25:08):
going to be any different than thanwhat we see everywhere. And maybe,
as you said, maybe the keydistinction is that because it's so new,
because the concept is so new.Maybe some of the some of the women
that are on the cusp of makingthat jump right now can't see it.
They can't see it, and theyhaven't had that dream since they were a

(25:29):
little girl of one day going pro. And maybe that's a little bit stronger
on the men's side as things standright now, but for me, it's
still very important that that you makethat an option. You know, if
somebody decides that they don't want topursue this as a career, then that's
that's their choice. But the factthat they couldn't before and they can't currently

(25:52):
until this all gets going is issomething that we really need to change in
this country. And you know,we've made a lot of progress the ten
fifteen years that I've been following this, but every step forward just sort of
reveals how many more steps forward youstill have to go. So it's it's
one of those unending journeys, andthe more progress you think you make,

(26:12):
the more you realize just how faraway you are from things. Yeah,
I think you nailed what I wastrying to say there, that it just
wasn't in the radar, right Andthe reason it's not on the radar that
idea that you have this pathway that'savailable to you that you can maybe sacrifice
for a year or so to getto a higher goal. This is just

(26:33):
not something that they grew up withthe belief that ever would exist. So
for someone at nineteen twenty years oldnow eighteen nineteen to suddenly be able to
reframe how they viewed the entire worldhow it's always been presented to them,
that's a very difficult question. So, you know, those first few years
might be filled out with with more, you know, imports than you'd like.
But as it gets older and thosepathways open up, and the pathway

(26:57):
is into European team that pay andpay in a way that's reliable and offers
an opportunity for them to look andaim towards getting to all of that starts
to get better, and you startto have more and more young girls actually
growing up dreaming of it and willingto make those sacrifices that you see in
the men's side. So often,you know, like me, a men's

(27:18):
player that has a CPL opportunity,has dreamt a playing in Europe or wherever
their whole life, and may seethat is the first step. Whereas a
female player just has well, here'san opportunity for you to extend your career,
and they'll be like, well,I'm not going to make the national
team at this point, so whywould I bother with this when I could
be an engineer or whatever they are. It's a challenge. Then there's always
lots of challenges. Speaking of challenges, we have some U seventeen news.

(27:42):
We wanted to talk about some othernews bits, so that that's kind of
going too that, James, youwant to start with you seventeens, and
you know, they lost five toone to end their tournament one zero and
three, so they still have notone at this event in the history of
the event. It's disappointing. Ithink, I don't know if I'm shocked

(28:03):
by it though, because this ishow it always seems to go for Canada.
James, Yeah, yeah, Ithink. You know, Canada loses
their final match five to one.It was a bit of a rough ending.
You know, you go behind oneearly goal in the fourteenth minute,
Maley adds the second one in thetwenty six or two. Then behind Canada
pulls one back. They get theirfirst goal to competition. Richard Chuku,

(28:27):
a defender sort of pops up outof corner kick, collects his own rebound
and puts that one in the backof the net. So you have a
glimpse of hope there. We hadspoken on the on the special edition that
we did earlier this week about how, you know, Canada was still in
play for second place and for thirdplace in the group if a lot of
things went their way, and somaybe there was a glimmer of light there.

(28:49):
But you know, the final final, twenty five to thirty minutes of
the game, Mali adds three moreto run that score up and you're going
home losing five to one goal inthe tournament, no points. As he
said, he didn't reach that historythat you had hoped with with a first
win at the U seventeen World Cup. And you know, I just did
a little, a little cursory sortof overview of what happened in that match.

(29:12):
And Molly had thirty two attempts atgoal in that game. And if
you're giving a team that many looks, it's never going to end well for
you. And you know, inthe other match of the group Spain,
and he's backstandrew too too, whichmight have been a little bit of a
surprise spin, took a two inthe leaders backstand, pulled two back and
Canada ends up finishing at the bottomwith a minus nine goal differential. So

(29:33):
far, only New Caledonia's minus twentyfour goal differential is keeping Canada off the
basement of the whole competition with afew group stage days one day or two
still to go, so Canada isgoing to be finishing, finishing at the
bottom of the overall table when thiscompetition wraps up. You know, there
was Andrew Laveri spoke after the matchjust in a press release that Canada Soccer

(29:56):
put out, and he said,you know, we're not needs to have
lost, but we can look atall three games and learn in different ways.
Whether it's the effort to fight,the quality. Uh, this is
the standard that players have to meet, and it's just a foundation for these
guys. Some of these guys willbe moving on to the next cycle with
the U twenties, and he knowsthat they're good enough to excel at that

(30:18):
level. So it's important to growfrom this experience. And I think my
big takeaway was that for Canada,I think I was optimistic going in that
that with some of the some ofthe players that this group had, with
some of the quality that they've thrownin CONCAF that that Firth win might not
prove so elusive. But it didn't. It didn't surprise me that or or

(30:41):
what we need to do, whatCanada needs to do is to get more
players into professional environments at earlier ages. You know, I don't think it
was a coincidence that the guys wholooked most comfortable were most at the level
throughout this tournament. Uh to Vernierfrom Forge to Heed from Vancouver, Stefanovitch
and Ergoppolis from TSC to know clearly, the young man who's playing over in

(31:03):
France and Mike Klukowski's son, AntonKlukowski, who's playing in Krouscher. I
believe, although I'm not not certainof that, they look the ones that
were most comfortable out there. Theylooked the ones that were the least intimidated
by the opponents. And you know, I think, I think there's a
mindset switch that happens when when guysare training every day and they're playing every

(31:25):
weekend against opposition that are trying tomake a living, you know, that
are trying to feed their families andearn that next contract, and there's a
point somewhere along the way where thegame transitions from being something you played as
a kid to being a real careerand the reality of that gets emphasized the
closer and closer you get to thatprofessional game. And you know, on

(31:45):
our preview episode, we we includeda bunch of comments from Azarsafanovit from a
conversation that John Molnar and I hadwith him at the end of the TFC
two season, and something that didn'tmake it into those clips but featured in
one of the TFC two end theseason piece as I did for Toronto,
was that he talked about that verything, that the biggest element in transitioning

(32:06):
from being an academy player to beinga professional player was that you're going up
against guys that are fighting and clawingto put food on the table and to
make something and to earn that nextcontract, as I said, and it's
not just against other talented kids whothe result doesn't matter that much. And
so that for me is the bigtakeaway that if Canada wants to find success

(32:28):
at this level. And I don'tknow that much about Uzbek football or about
football and Bali. So, Ican't say how many players on this team
or that team were in better ormore professional environments compared to some of the
Canadian guys, but that to mewas the standard difference. Was that the
risk that you take when you playa back ball or when you make a

(32:51):
mistake, the need to be moreperfected to execute was what let Canada down
in this situation. And so youknow, going forward, I expect we'll
see a number of the Toronto guysend up pushing into TFC two. You
know, Masee camier O Mayze sawfifteen minutes with TFC two this year.
Chukwu and Nathaniel Abraham, the goalkeeperwho I thought was a particular who,

(33:15):
aside from from the poor goal hegave up in that one match, was
our real last stand up player fromCanada. And this uh, so I
expect we'll see that. I expectwe'll see you know, more CPL guys
get into the mix in future groups. But you know, could that have
happened sooner? Is there a wayto get more of these fifteen year old,
sixteen year olds those opportunities to startcutting their teeth in the professional game.

(33:36):
And you know where my mind wentafter the game was as much as
as much as we want to seethat progress made, we're still in those
really first generations of players that havecome through the soccer pathways that have come
through. With the soccer pathways thatare being created in this country being consistent
and viable, you know, ittakes time to develop these situations. And

(34:00):
you know, I remember having aconversation with and about guys like rock Overmeo
and Nobel Lacello and Julian Dunn asbeing the first guys to have to have
entered TFC when they were twelve andto come out and sign professional contracts when
they're seventeen, eighteen nineteen, andyou know, they're twenty one, twenty
two now, and so we're stillreally so early in the development of the

(34:24):
pathways that we need. And youknow, on this show, we talked
to a lot of people, andI firmly believe that there's a lot of
good work going on at these levels, But even the best minds in the
world can't snap their fingers and changethe history and change the atmosphere like that.
I know, we live in aworld where everybody wants everything now,
but that history and that culture thatcomes from that matters and you know,

(34:49):
there's an element of belief to mein achieving everything, and we saw a
little bit of that in this Canadagroup. Some of those words pre tournament
about we're going to go out thereand we're going to put the shirt in
a better place, We're going toget these wins. We can do it.
That's that's that the starting phases ofthat belief and that desire is what
you need to see. But desirecan be fragile, and so Canada couldn't

(35:13):
withstand the red card that Alessandro Biellogot in that first match, and I
think I think losing him he endedup being suspended for this Malley game as
well. Losing a guy who wasa real force in that midfield and really
set the tempo for the side,for the side and was a real leader
in the group, I think Ithink affected them going through the second and
third matches. They couldn't withstand thesecond goal against Uzbekistan. That was sort

(35:35):
of the first one game as asurprise. Maybe you can find a way
to react to going down one nill, but once that second one comes,
that game was pretty much over.And then they couldn't handle the pressure and
the energy and the quality from fromMali in that third game, and the
strength that you need to survive thosemoments only comes with time and as much
as we want it to be now, you know, we're just getting started

(35:58):
here. Yeah, I mean,the TFC Academy started in two thousand and
eight. And when I say itstarted in two thousand and eight, I
mean they identified an academy in twothousand and eight. It was probably about
twenty eleven twenty twelve before they startedto really operate as such. So we're
talking about a decade. You know, they play Spain in the first game
of that and you're playing a countrythat has structures in place that they go

(36:21):
back one hundred and fifty years insome cases, so you know, it's
it's not even comparable. I knowa lot of people are going to try
and look at selection and say thatthe blame for the youth results comes from
the fact that they constantly only pickedfrom three programs, the three top level
academies top level professional academies operated inthis country. I'm going to say this
bluntly. The problem isn't that they'reselecting from the three professional academies in the

(36:45):
country, only or mostly it's thatthere are only three. We need the
campl TEA to start to step upand develop those those those platforms. And
that's the important thing. We're notgoing to win a U seventeen World Cup,
not in my lifetime. That's thissimply not going to happen unless there's
some wounder can that comes out ofnowhere, right, you know that can

(37:08):
happen, but it's it's unlikely.What what we can do is we can
set the structure up so for along term success, so that when we're
having a conversation like this, youknow, when I'm old and gray,
older and gray, or I willbe able to talk about as having you
know, structures that go back thirtyforty years and we're able to tap into
consistently. And you know, there'snot three programs we're picking from, but

(37:30):
there's ten. And they've been playingeach other and being competing against each other
since they were young kids and beingpushed. You know, when you have
ten guys from the same program,that tells me that they're not used to
being they're allowed to make mistakes attheir level because even if they're in a
professional environment, they're still not gettingpushed and punished for the mistakes they make

(37:50):
day and day out. They needto be challenged, they need to have
that, you know, fear thatthey're going to lose that spot, and
they don't have enough of that inthis country yet to be truly competitive at
a wik up level. All youcan keep doing is going back and trying
to get more and more experience andkeep working towards it. And I do
believe there are people that are workingand working hard towards fixing these problems.
And you know, it's going totake some time to fix the structural stuff.

(38:15):
And in the meantime, we havea wonder can we can watch at
the national team level, So thatkind of career paves over some cracks.
So that's a good thing. We'lltalk about that to end the show.
A couple more news bets first though, speaking of you seventeen level the women.
You know, the great thing aboutyouth or youth levels is that there's
always a tournament to prepare for.And the U seventeen women are in Portugal

(38:35):
to prepare for their qualifying, whichI believe takes place soon after we start
season two in February. Correct,Yes, yes, they're getting ready for
the twenty twenty four COMPACAF Women's USEseventeen Championships. They will play three matches
in Mexico next February. They'll besquaring off against Puerto Rico on the second,
Panama on the fourth, and theUSA on February sixth, So mark

(38:58):
that on your calendars now, it'llbe February before we know it. As
if the offseason has taught me anythingover all these years, it's that it's
over before before you can even imagine, and we're right back into the ground.
So yeah, Canada announced the Useventeen camp in Portugal. They're going
to train for a week and thengo to Lisbon for a pair of matches
against the Portuguese U seventeens on Novembertwenty first and November twenty third. There's

(39:22):
a handful of new faces from thegroup that qualified for the New seventeen Championship
back in August, and there's plentyof familiar names that you know, we've
seen through that competition, whether itwas with Canada or or what they've done
with their club sides in the NeedleBC and whatnot. You know, Annabel
and Isabelle Trucku on the list KayleeHunter and Kira Martin to a white Caps

(39:45):
standout players are in the group aswell, and head coach Emma Humphries is
very excited for this camp. Youdon't often see exclamation marks and press releases,
so I thought that was worth noting, and she basically said that,
you know, we have a talentedgroup young players that are ready for a
test against an experienced European opposition.Camp is all about assessing where the team

(40:06):
and players are and growing from theexperience as they head towards that punk Cast
tournament in the new year. SoI'm not sure if we're going to be
able to watch those games, butsome of going to keep an eye on
for sure. And I thought therewas a neat parallel with the men's use
sevent teams where they had the opportunityto go to Brazil in their preparation for
the World Cup, and now thewomen get this chance to go to Portugal

(40:27):
and to have that experience and havethat time together before you know, the
big, the big tournament in February, So you're really glad to see that.
Yeah, you know, to tiethe men and the women's together for
a second, I don't think youcan blame the federation for not giving these
kids the prep time. I mean, they got a trip to Brazil,
they get a trip to Portugal.I think there was some indication that maybe

(40:50):
the Brazilian federation helped with the mengetting down there, but it doesn't matter.
That was still arranged and they stillwere given an opportunity to succeed,
and I think that you can't reallyput much blame on that. And the
blame really is structural, and it'sit's long term, and it's not something
you can really, you know,yell at someone and fix it overnight.
So I don't think we can reallygo down that path too much. But
when it comes to the women,obviously they're starting in a different place,

(41:13):
and we'll watch that tournament closely inFebruary, and you would hope that they
would have a very good opportunity toqualify for a World Cup and we can
have these conversations again that we justhad for the men. There. Finally,
before we wrap up with a littlemen's national team talk. It's not
a development this is a development show, but we always talk about the national
team, So save that for theend of the show. Before that,

(41:34):
we got the League one through nineteenright their fall series. Their finals are
taking place this weekend. Can youtell us a bit of that, James.
Yeah, there's two more matches toadd to that match watch list that
you've got going on this weekend.In the women's unineteen final it will be
the North Toronto Nitrosens Russi Academy atone pm. And then the men's UniTeam
Final it will be Sigma FC againstthe TFC Academy at four pms. That

(42:00):
one's that one's setting up to bepretty tasty. And then I just wanted
to give a bit of a shoutout to the League one site. There
a nice interview with Cinco County roversAllen Say the guy a young man that
turned some heads this year, wasinvolved with the Canadian seventeen program, and
just a good chat with him aboutwhat was a pretty big year for a
young man. So go check thatout at the League one at the League

(42:22):
one site and tune into those twomatches on Saturday. Should be. Should
be fascinating. I've got the YouTubenotifications set to remind me in case I
get lost in something else. Fairenough TFC segment that's almost a derby that's
got some feel there. I'm surethat there'll be a lot of pride on
the state there for what pathway playerschoose. But two good programs in the

(42:45):
GTA that are creaking out some talent, and well we'll hope to have a
good one there, all right.National team they are in Jamaica right now
as I speak what we are recordingthis at four twenty two pm Eastern day
at a time on Friday, sowe're about three hours away from kickoff in
the first leg up two in theNations League quarterfinals. But that's not really

(43:08):
what this is about. This isthe couple of America qualifier. James,
what are your where's your conference level? Heading into this tie Wich makeup?
It's interesting it's been a roller coasterfor the Comaditian men's team in the last
year. I want to say,you go from the highs of qualifying for
that first World Cup in twenty oddyears whatever it was, and then you

(43:31):
go into the disappointment that the lasteight months have been. It seems like
you know that one step forward,two step back thing has been a little
bit of an issue. You haveJohn Herdman leaving the program, you have
Marlbiello in his Stead taking over managerialmanagerial reigns on an interim basis. You
know, We've had a couple ofconversations Withmorrow this past week. He's on

(43:53):
top of things. I've always likedTomorrow. He's got a good head on
his shoulders, and he knows,he knows how to get into these situations.
And you know, I think forme the big question mark is is
can Canada find it within themselves tocompete against a team that's that's in good
form. You know, the onlythe only match that we have since since

(44:15):
the Gold Cup, which I thinkwas a little bit of a disappointment,
is the loss of way to dependand the circumstances around that, flying halfway
across the world to play on Japanesesoil, and you know, in the
middle of a in the middle ofyour regular seasons, at an awkward time
in the year for both North Americanplayers and European players. You can't take
too much out of that for oneloss. And so the question for me

(44:37):
is is can the guys put putwhat's been a rocky eight to twelve months
behind them and find some way toachieve something big. You know, it's
not only the concaffe Nations League Finals. That's that's at stake. But that
spot in the twenty twenty four CocoAmerica, as you mentioned, and you
know, I don't know where whereI'm thinking right now. I haven't one

(45:00):
of the one of the problems withnot having matches to have seen this group
plays. They haven't had the battle. We haven't seen them win those battles
on the pitch. So so youknow, we can, we can,
they can say all the right things, players can be in the right mindset,
but until you're until you're on thatpitch in Kingston, Jamaica, we
don't know what's going to happen.And you know, when when the news

(45:22):
came out that that the top fourseeds in CONCACAF weren't going to be involved
in the group stage, I sortof sort of was a little bit worried
in the sense that one of thethings that helped Canada to succeed in World
Cup qualification and the last go aroundwas the fact that they started somewhere and
they just had regular games and theywere getting together every two or three months,

(45:44):
and that allowed them to build thecamaraderie and the familiarity and the the
vibe that that rode them to thetop of concercaffe in qualification for twenty twenty
two. And you know, withwith all the change that's happened, with
all the apsent we've had the lastcouple of months, I don't know where
where that vibe is right now.And so you come into a competition against

(46:07):
a team like Jamaica who's got astar started lineup and is feeling pretty good
after strolling through not strolling. Theyhave some defensive frailties that I think Canada
can look to exploit just looking atsome of the results they got in the
group stage. But a team that'shad, you know, two months of
getting together and playing important matches andbeing together as a group against the side

(46:29):
that hasn't is always a little bitdangerous. So first leg in Caston tonight
should be fascinating, and then nextTuesday in Toronto at Bimo Field will be
equally So I think my biggest takeawayfrom the conversations with Marrow was just that
you know, he said he knowsand the players know that there's going to
be a lot of chaos in thisone hundred and eighty plus minutes of action.

(46:51):
So I guess all I can sayis I'm looking forward to it.
We all probably record Wednesday morning sowe can talk a little bit about this
match. James, there's a littlenote for you. I got an early
weather report here for you folks.It says they're calling on Tuesday night currently.
I'll just read it for you.Cloudy with soaking rain for part of

(47:12):
the night. Windy. That's fromwhere I'm in the city, bemo Field,
off of the lake. I'm justgoing to say, layer up if
you're going forty five klumbra praer windgus minus six windschill. So I think
Jamaica will love that. So thekey, I think, having said that,
is to not rely on the weather. But you know you do have

(47:32):
that in your back pocket. Thoseconditions are going to favor the northern country.
You got to make sure you getthrough the first lake tonight without you
know, dropping it too much.I was on a show today in the
US Soccer down here in Atlanta.But regardless, you can look at my
social media for it if you wantto hear my parents on that. But
they asked me about the national teamand my thoughts on this. And look,

(47:54):
I know John Herban's left and thathas a lot of people down,
a lot of people down the program, but there's still talent. There's still
high end talent there. I thinkif you look on paper, this is
still a team that has players thatJamaica just doesn't have. I'm not going
to say this is going to bean easy tie for them, but they
do have the ability to win thisthing, and it starts with the result

(48:15):
tonight, the night of recording hereas we talk about it's also the two
year anniversary of Ice Techa. Bythe way, for folks, by the
time you're listening to this, itwon't be but I thought that was an
interesting sort of coincidence there. Look, as long as Alfonso Davies and Jonathan
David are on this team, they'regoing to have a chance to win,
and they should be amongst the bestteams in Conker caff And they need to
go out and prove it. Theyneed to stop bickering and they need to

(48:36):
go out and you replicate that performancethat saw them have such a big win
in Edmonton two years ago. Todayat the time of recording, all right,
James in that note, no sensebreaking this down anymore. But as
I said, we'll talk about thisresult next week. We have two more
weeks before we take a break forseason two of the podcast. I'm excited
to my naming. This is sucha geek. I'm excited by the naming

(48:59):
convention that I'm going to put inthere for the podcast. You there because
I have some ideas on the seO front that might help us out.
So that's where my head is,James. But on that note, I'll
let you say goodbye today because Ialways do it awkwardly. Goodbye. Fine,