[2010 World Cup Qualifier] Canada vs Mexico September 10th

[Regs]

Can Canada pull this one off? Would a draw be a good result?

For me, a draw would be a very good result, one that would instill a bit more hope that we, as a soccer nation, can still qualify.

I see reading around the intraweb there are those that are going off on the deep-end a bit and not only calling for Dale Mitchell's head (understandable to a certain degree) but also heaping the blame squarely on the CSA. Right then.

An open letter to the CSA Board of Directors from a disenchanted fan

September 8, 2008 - Dino Rossi

Gentlemen

I'm writing to you today to make it known that I, and the majority of Canadian soccer supporters, are thoroughly disgusted that Dale Mitchell was on Sunday's flight out of Montreal en route to Mexico. He should have been heading home to British Columbia after Saturday's disaster in Montreal.

Your unwillingness to demand that Dale falls on his sword or be pushed onto it is appalling. What it says to the supporters of the national team is that nothing has changed when it comes to the CSA. As always, there is no Accountability. 1 point from a possible 6 out of two home games is simply not acceptable.

The last 5-6 months of relative peace, calm and co-operation are over. Canadian supporters will not be quiet and patient. If we don't win on Wednesday (and a win is the only option), it's going to get VERY ugly. If you thought last year was uncomfortable, just wait. All I can say to you is PRAY FOR A WIN on Wednesday, and even a win on Wednesday might not save this round.

Sometimes I wonder why I even care about Canadian soccer when its so obvious that the people at the top of the CSA pyramid don't (or if they do care, they don't have the stones to do what needs to be done). Shame on all of you!

Sincerely,

Dino Rossi
dinorossijr@hotmail.com

"Just Wait" - Wait for what? WTF are you going to do?

Seriously, I'm all for pushing for change but this is why Supporter groups in this country are a bit of a joke when it comes to effective communication. Read that open letter. If it was directed at you, what would you make of it?

If Canada wins tomorrow, and I pray that they do, what do you think all these nutbars are going to be saying?

Please Canada, for nothing else but my pure TTP enjoyment, get that result in Mexico!

 

[Mr. X]

I really hope Canada pulls off a win. The first two games have been giant letdowns after thinking we'd have 2 wins or at least a win and a tie after them. With a win here there is still hope and maybe a bit of momentum. Go Canada.

The Supporters groups sound like the same nutbars who call in to Pratt & Taylor after a Canuck loss wanting trades and firings.

 

[BlazeArmy]

What i want to know is how does the scheduling get made up?

Why the hell are we playing the first 2 games at home in basically the summer still. Would it not be better to have them playing in October when it is a bit colder for the most part all over Canada. How would those 2 countries like Edmonton in october and november. Pretty sure they wouldnt like that at all.

 

[trece verde]

Regs:

This is the same individual who was interviewed in an unnamed publication fronted by a person who posts on here sporadically. If said publication is to be believed, he's a bit more actively involved in trying to change the status quo at the CSA head office.

Unsubstantiable quote from said publication:

Indeed, it turns out that change has long been recommended to the CSA – and not only by fans, the media and even their own national team players. An internal review of the CSA, produced by Deloitte in 2005, found that the CSA needed a complete restructuring. The report, recently released to the public by none other than Rossi and some allies, found that the CSA was too regionalized, too inexperienced and too unprofessional to ever bring about the type of change needed to make Canadian soccer competitive with the best in the world.
Among the “critical” changes recommended in the Deloitte report were the creation of a true CEO position, and a less-hands-on Board of Directors. Neither recommendation has been followed, as the recent resignation of Linford suggests.

Not sure how he would have obtained access to an auditor's report like this one, but if this is to be believed, he might have some good material to hold some CSA feet to the fire.

I'm hoping against hope that the boys in the red and white are able to do something that seems like an insurmountable task right now and get an away win. Pretty tough when the closest thing we have in this country to a real soccer icon (Craig Forrest - yeah, I know...) has already written the team off as out of contention.

Trece

 

[Regs]

OK, this Dino Rossi name sounds vaguely familar, perhaps he is a part of the CSF that formed to overthrow the government, erm, CSA... if so, seems to be a bit of an opportunistic bunch... all from Ontario at that, go figure

That bunch disappeared faster than a small baby left on RangerForever's doorstep, yes, even faster than the one left on BlazeArmy's

If people are looking for a true soccer icon in this country, why does no one look at Tony Waiters? I'll tell you why, these supposed soccer supporters don't know sweet fcuk all about the game but hey, they know how to write on the Intraweb. Like me.



Go Canada.

 

[BlazeArmy]

That bunch disappeared faster than a small baby left on RangerForever's doorstep, yes, even faster than the one left on BlazeArmy's

It was basted in BBQ sauce, what can i say.

 

[johnnybluenose]

A lot of hand wringing and handbags...

Look, we all know Soccer is flawed in Canada.

We have no pro league that is 100% ours. We have the MLS, USL-1, USL-2, PDL< and CSL(semi pro at best)

We have beaurecrats who know little to nothing about the game running the show

We have just started, just this last qualification cycle, flying our guys home from overseas on business class...

Onto the last two games...

First game against Jamaica we should have had the three points, Onstadt shat it and the ref was poor to close out the game...Karma? Luck? or just not having a killer instinct? Who knows, the Canucks played more than well enough to have deserved better than the one point

Second game against Honduras, the team went to sleep after Radz got hurt. The problem of lack of depth was shown in this game...Hume came on for Radz and the team went to sleep, Stalteri looked old and slow, De Guzman was not intense, De Rosario looked indifferent, Hutchinson looked better, but is not the type of player to put the team on his back.

Mitchell out? Sure, if the CSA can talk anyone better into taking over the reigns...but I sincerely doubt it. I have a few questions to ask of him, specifically like why Olivier Occean is not being called, and why more pressure is not being put on the three Canadian Clubs for more Canadians to be signed instead of our intl arch-nemesis's better players (Ruiz, Guevarra, etc)

A fans group trying to overthrow the CSA is laughable at best...We all know a lot of the V's can be really sound guys, but not many of them have ever kicked a ball...Dan Russell is one of Hockey's best pundits in this neck of the woods, but every now and then you get the feeling, listening to him, that he has never laced up a pair of skates, and you know what...he never has. being a soccer/football degenerate, watching footy all day, does not an expert make...And sadly many of the supporters groups here in Canada have that....The Red Patch Boys, The Voyageurs, the Impact Montreal Ultra's, and our own Southsiders...

 

[beckhamandposh]

What i want to know is how does the scheduling get made up?

Why the hell are we playing the first 2 games at home in basically the summer still. Would it not be better to have them playing in October when it is a bit colder for the most part all over Canada. How would those 2 countries like Edmonton in october and november. Pretty sure they wouldnt like that at all.

FIFA does the scheduling. But CSA does have a choice in where the game is played. CSA will pick the cost effective site. But for the return leg against Mexico, wouldn't a game on the Rock in St Johns, cold and rainy October or November, give the Canadians an advantage. And it appears the East has wrestle some power back to the East. Fewer players from the West than in recent past.

Games need to be in Vancouver where the grass is use to rain. The grass in Montreal was sub-par by any standard.

Wake up Vancouver City Hall and Port of Vancouver. Get the waterfront Stadium deal done!!!!

 

[johnnybluenose]

globeandmail.com: On Soccer - Knight: It's time for Mitchell to go

Ben Knight agrees with Mr Rossi...

 

[johnnybluenose]

Reality bites - Sportsnet.ca
And Dobson, kind of, talking about not ruffling feathers

He does make 1 excellent point, and I will further that point.

WHY THE FCUK DOES ANY "NATIONAL TEAM" PLAY GAMES IN QUEBEC!?

kj and I were discussing this while watching the game...Why play the games in foreign soil!? There is a reason more Hondurans than Canadians were there....There are probably more Hondurans at that game than "Canadians" in Quebec.
There is a reason Molson Canada markets Export in Quebec and not Molson Canadian.
There is a reason you will see more Fleur-De-lis in Quebec than Maple Leaf Flags

It is shameful that the CSA and ticketmaster allowed this to happen...Montreal should never, ever, ever, ever, get a MNT game again...Stade Saputo be damned.

 

[johnnybluenose]

Some Canadian Guys Writing About Soccer

The match that took place over the weekend between Canada and Honduras can be summed up in one word: disgrace.

Having taken the road trip from Toronto to Montreal for the purposes of watching this all-important World Cup qualifier live at Saputo Stadium, I can say there were some positives. Hundreds of others joined me in travelling to Montreal to support the Canadian squad, and took place in a boisterous march from a downtown pub to the stadium. Several members of the Voyageurs worked tirelessly to organize these efforts not only on matchday, but for weeks beforehand. And the Canadian squad had a generally solid first half, sparked by a very early Adrian Serioux goal and some highly competent possession play.

Do not let these positives fool you. From start to finish, this was a debacle. There were many culprits who came together to create this disaster, so I’ll just call out each entity on its own.

Admission. This Quebec-based offshoot of TicketMaster showed astonishing incompetence in its handling of ticket sales. Many Canadian fans were denied tickets (or thought they had been denied tickets) after the company failed to properly equip and handle its online and phone-based ticketing system. There was also no secret code necessary to purchase tickets in the supposed “Canadian supporter sections”, meaning that infiltration by Honduran fans was almost assured.

The Canadian Soccer Association. An easy and well-worn target, to be sure, but the CSA (despite some encouraging signs prior to the Canada/Jamaica match in Toronto last month) once again showed its completely inability and/or unwillingness to do what was necessary to create a pro-Canadian environment. They left ticket sales entirely to Admission, with no mandate to restrict access to tickets by Honduran fans, or to give special access to, say, the Montreal Ultras. And they did nothing whatsoever, to my knowledge, to promote the match to the casual soccer fan or general public.

Saputo Stadium. When it comes to monstrous incompetence and negligence, the authorities at Saputo Stadium take the cake. The security presence was laughably inadequate, and the police presence was non-existent. There were no patdowns upon entering the stadium, and Canadian and Honduran supporters were sent to co-mingle underneath the bleachers after the match, even though dozens of them had just engaged in a violent scuffle as the match ended. It is honestly a miracle that no one was seriously injured.

Montreal “soccer fans”. I use the quotation marks because if such a group truly does exist, you never would have known it. Out of the announced crowd of 12,500 (not a sell-out, by the way), it’s safe to say that at least 8,000 were Hondurans. The only noise being made for Canada was coming from the supporter section who were sectioned off behind the east goal like a bunch of caged rats. Even then, although I did speak to a few members of the Montreal Ultras, it seemed like most of those in the supporter section were from Toronto or elsewhere. One of the girls working at a concession stand actually asked me, out of the blue, “Are you from Toronto?” I said, “Yeah, I am. How’d you know?” “Everyone here seems to be.” “Well,” I asked, “where are all the fans from Montreal?” She pointed to herself and her coworked and said, unhappily, “We’re all working here tonight.”

Major League Soccer. David Beckham or not, MLS is a God damned sham of a league. It’s a regional, rinky-dinky, Mickey Mouse organization with zero credibility. How else could you explain that the league is the only one of any note in the entire world that holds matches that come into conflict with FIFA international dates? Not only was Toronto FC left shorthanded by nine players called up for international duty, but the Canadian national team was deprived of, potentially, hundreds if not thousands of soccer fans who would have also made the trek to Montreal if the MLS had done the reasonable thing and rescheduled the TFC match. One might say that the onus is on TFC fans to show loyalty to their country over their club. This is somewhat unfair, as they were only forced to make that difficult choice in the first place by the short-sighted and idiotic leadership of MLS.

Saputo Stadium, part 2. You may recall a few months ago, when the stadium opened, its pitch was being heralded as immaculate, the best in Canada. The men’s national team preferred its surface to the unforgiving turf at BMO Field. And yet on Saturday, mere months after the stadium opened, the field looked like it had been attacked by hundreds of drunken golfers, only 15 minutes into the game. The stadium crew — consisting of no fewer than 20 people — worked feverishly at half time, pushing back the divots with pointed sticks. It was embarrassing.

Honduran fans. I’m not painting them all with the same brush, obviously. But many of those situated behind the east goal proved themselves to be classless, worthless scourges on society. As if taunting the Canadian supporters and hurling beer in our direction wasn’t enough, a few of them initiated fistfights in the stands (which, as noted above, miraculously didn’t result in any serious injuries). The fanbase as a whole seemed to be much more aggressive than the Jamaicans (perhaps emboldened by their numerical advantage at Saputo Stadium), and many of them roared down the main drags in Montreal, cursing at Canadian fans and waving Honduran flags… all with Quebec, Ontario, New York, etc. license plates affixed to their vehicles. The whole “national identity” argument is one for another day, but on the whole, many of the Honduran fans proved themselves to be utter pieces of shite.

The refereeing. It’s easy (and appropriate, in this case) to blame one referee for a poor match. But there’s a reason I say “refereeing”. It’s because this match’s official, from Costa Rica, is seemingly no different than any of CONCACAF’s other “capable” referees, in the sense that he is outlandishly incompetent. I can think of few things more maddening than seeing a legitimate foul by an opposition player go unpunished and then, moments later, to see said opposition player take a pathetic and obvious dive, and earn a free kick. This was in full effect on Saturday, even leading to a red card for Patrice Bernier after an infuriatingly obvious dive by Amado Guevara. Perhaps this doesn’t matter to CONCACAF, since the “dive and waste time” culture is ingrained into soccer consciousness in most Central American countries anyway. But that doesn’t make it right. As a referee myself (obviously at a much, much lower level) I am personally disgusted to be associated with such sheer ineptitude and/or corruption.

Dale Mitchell. I won’t spend any time here, as it seems obvious that he’s going to be sacked as soon as this qualifying campaign is over. But to take what was supposedly a golden generation of Canadian talent and produce the steaming pile of garbage that has been large swathes of the past two matches… ridiculous.

In case you somehow hadn’t heard, Honduras won the match 2-1. While still mathematically alive, Canada needs an awful lot of things to happen (some of them very unlikely) in order to have a hope of making it to the next round of qualifying. And that is why this is a dark day for Canadian soccer. All of the optimism that existed heading into the match against Jamaica — that the team could qualify, and that the sport could finally break through in the general Canadian consciousness — has seemingly been squandered in two short weeks. Anything less than a miracle in the next four matches, and we’ll all be right back where we started: surrounded by ignorance and outright hostility amongst the Canadian media and general public, who seem to take some sort of morbid delight in proclaiming: “Who cares about the Canadian soccer team? We never win anything anyway.”

And ultimately, despite the huge number of factors working against the boys in red on this night, the propagation of that attitude may end up being the most damaging factor of all.

 

[Regs]

We have just started, just this last qualification cycle, flying our guys home from overseas on business class...

This is actually an important note - I heard Craig Forest on the Team 1040 last week talking about how the CSA chartered a plane for the team to get to Mexico after the Mexicans schedued the game in southern city not as accessible as Azteca is. For all the CSA's faults, if you want to be critical, I think it is important to also acknowledge positive changes as well.

As for Ben Knight, I really think he is starting to get a little too close to the "Vees" and his writing is begining to cater to them. Know what I mean? It's great to have a media ally but IMO it is a line to be carefully walked, by all parties.

B&P - the return Mexico leg is in Edmonton in October, nothing wrong with that. Plus, hindsight is 20/20... everyone thought Montreal was a good choice and that Toronto was piss-poor for those 2 games and yet look at the difference is the crowd support - Toronto was on fire and Montreal shouldn't have another game hosting for a very long time.

As for Vancouver, yes, a stadium is needed to ever host but then there is also the travel aspect to the West for our MNT players coming over from Europe - not a huge deal but that extra 5 hours on a plane can be a bit of an excuse, especially if they ever get grass put into BMO in Toronto.

 

[Regs]

It is shameful that the CSA and ticketmaster allowed this to happen...Montreal should never, ever, ever, ever, get a MNT game again...Stade Saputo be damned.

While the CSA definately does have work to do in the marketing department, people really need to look at the things they ARE doing to better the situation, namely, how the players are being treated.

From the above described plane charters to listening to the players wishes to play in Montreal rather than Toronto, there ARE signs that the CSA is trying to be more accountable.

I find it laughable that the CSA actually sat down with certain people associated with these groups, heard out their complaints, have tried to actually address some of the concerns, and now some of these same groups are crying bloody murder w/o having a brain in their head

On the Vees board, I saw someone post in the game thread that the thread had 4000 views about 2 hours after the game... this poster went on to insinuate that the Vees have power now, just look at all those views! Well numbnuts, during an in-game thread, how many times did you refresh/return to the thread to see what was being said? I'm not even considered a Vee and I know I hit it about 20 times over the course of the game and afterwards. Do the fcuking math

 

[johnnybluenose]

Yeah, the Vees are what they are...They aren't the issue...they don't have "power" too many self absorbed tossers...They are not the problem, they showed up en masse.

Hearing what the "Ultras" are going through with Joey and the Impact is shameful, at least here with the Caps we griped and they answered our prayers and then some...On Sunday the Southside looked and felt like it did 5 years ago...Porta-Potties, signs warning parents of "adult Behavior" in the area, bleachers moved into the fence to create a pseudo terrace if you will... The Ultras are getting the beat down by the Impact, and got screwed for this game, many of them were told the game was sold out, they couldn't get tix etc...Imagine the troubles if the Southsiders were treated this way if vancouver were to host a game in the near future for the MNT.

I also think that Vancouver, along with Montreal, should be the last place the MNT should be playing any games of any note or importance...too much of a diverse community, we will be hard pressed to have a "home game" in Vancouver.

 

[kjohnsob]

Is this game on TV on the digital sportsnet channels? Or jsut streaming online?

 

[Regs]

This game is being shown LIVE on all digital sportsnet channels as well as online for sure - not sure if it is being shown live on the analog channel.

 

[beckhamandposh]

This is actually an important note - I heard Craig Forest on the Team 1040 last week talking about how the CSA chartered a plane for the team to get to Mexico after the Mexicans schedued the game in southern city not as accessible as Azteca is. For all the CSA's faults, if you want to be critical, I think it is important to also acknowledge positive changes as well.

B&P - the return Mexico leg is in Edmonton in October, nothing wrong with that. Plus, hindsight is 20/20... everyone thought Montreal was a good choice and that Toronto was piss-poor for those 2 games and yet look at the difference is the crowd support - Toronto was on fire and Montreal shouldn't have another game hosting for a very long time.

As for Vancouver, yes, a stadium is needed to ever host but then there is also the travel aspect to the West for our MNT players coming over from Europe - not a huge deal but that extra 5 hours on a plane can be a bit of an excuse, especially if they ever get grass put into BMO in Toronto.

I referred a game on the Rock in 1986 which demonstrated a smart tactical choice in picking venues. Yes, Edmonton is a decent choice and Commonwealth stadium will have decent grass.

MLS may not be the answer but it will have to do. If Vancouver and Montreal do get franchises, maybe the next generation of MNT players will get better. If a majority of these players play in the MLS, then travel will never be an excuse. But of course, we are talking well into the future.

Best of luck to the MNT tomorrow in southern Mexico. There's always WC2014 and 2018 to hang our hopes to..

 

[italian_stallion21]

Sportsnet has the game on all channels at 9 PM, is this the actual kick off? Seems kinda late to me.

 

[trece verde]

tape delayed...

Most of Mexico is in the Central Time Zone. This is not to be confused with Latin Time.

Algo vez,

Trece

 

[Regs]

Sportsnet has the game on all channels at 9 PM, is this the actual kick off? Seems kinda late to me.

That's EASTERN.

The game is LIVE at 6:00PM PACIFIC.