Canadians bounce back with trademark performance, close in on Olympic berth

After a disastrous FIFA World Cup this previous summer season, the Canadian girls’s staff returned to the fundamentals on Friday evening. 

In doing so, Canada finds itself on the cusp of qualifying for the 2024 Paris Olympics after incomes a 2-0 highway win over Jamaica within the first leg of its Concacaf Olympic play-in sequence at Independence Park in Kingston, Jamaica.  

Nichelle Prince and Adriana Leon scored for Canada, which solely wants a attract subsequent Tuesday’s return match at Toronto’s BMO Field to qualify for the Olympics. Even a 1-0 loss could be sufficient for the Canadians to punch their ticket for Paris. 

Prince scored for the primary time in practically two years for her nation and Leon marked her one centesimal look for Canada together with her thirtieth worldwide aim. The Canadians’ longstanding scoring points have been nicely documented, highlighted by their anemic offensive manufacturing on the World Cup after they scored simply twice, one among which was by way of an own-goal. So, the very fact they have been capable of put two targets previous Jamaican goalkeeper Rebecca Spencer whereas captain and all-time prime scorer Christine Sinclair was on the bench for your complete sport is a optimistic growth for a staff that desperately wanted to interrupt out of its scoring funk. 

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But the energy of Canada’s defending on Friday evening shouldn’t be neglected because it supplied the muse upon which this necessary victory was earned. 

Canada’s capability to defend has lengthy been its hallmark within the worldwide sport. The gold medal in Tokyo was secured not due to the staff’s scoring prowess, however its capability to thwart its opponents from doing so. The Canadians conceded only one aim in three knockout matches in the course of the 2021 Olympics, utilizing their defensive grit and metal to get the higher of prime nations resembling Brazil, the United States and Sweden. 

But one way or the other, Canada had misplaced its method. The staff’s defence had turn out to be penetrable in coughing up 12 targets in its first seven video games this 12 months with simply two shutouts. 

“Canada doesn’t concede [goals] but 2023 was the year of conceding … Ultimately we need to get back to the values and the things that are associated with this team for sure,” coach Bev Priestman stated within the buildup to Friday’s sport within the Jamaican capital. 

Against the Reggae Girlz, Canada saved issues tight on the again and fully neutralized Jamaica’s Bunny Shaw, one of many prime forwards on this planet and a finalist for this 12 months’s Ballon d’Or. Canadian goalkeeper Kailen Sheridan solely needed to make one save on the evening, within the 79th minute.  

Switching to a 3-5-2 formation from the 4-2-3-1 setup that Priestman had most well-liked in current instances allowed the Canadians to achieve a powerful defensive maintain on the sport. The centre again trio of veterans Kadeisha Buchanan and Vanessa Gilles and teenager Jade Rose flawlessly managed the competition by preserving the motion in entrance of them and have been ably abetted by the workhorse efforts of Quinn in central midfield. 

“I thought in organized play, we were very good. And to be honest I celebrated the clean sheet because it has to be; it’s the foundation of what this team is. We came in with that goal and we achieved it,” Priestman stated within the post-game press convention. 

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The stout defensive group proven by the Canadians on the evening harkened again to the Tokyo Olympics when the brand new centre again pairing of Buchanan and Gilles masterfully mixed to marshal a four-woman again line that gave little or no away. Playing alongside Rose (a 20-year-old junior at Harvard University) on Friday, Buchanan and Gilles seemed fully invigorated after each suffered by poor particular person World Cup campaigns. 

With issues taken care of on the again finish, Canada confidently broke ahead in numbers seeking targets, particularly down the flanks in opposition to a compact Jamaican staff that defended in a deep block. In explicit, Ashley Lawrence pushed the assault together with her probing runs down the precise aspect. It was Lawrence’s who used her pace to offer a Jamaican defender the slip earlier than delivering a pinpoint cross into the field that led to Prince’s opening aim within the 18th minute.

Leon’s aim in harm time without work a setup from a substitute Gabrielle Carle got here after Canada’s bend-but-don’t-break defence repelled Jamaica’s persistent attacking advances for the ultimate quarter-hour of regulation time.  

This was Canada’s first outing since its nightmarish 4-0 defeat to Australia again in July that hastened its early exit from the World Cup. The reminiscence of that humbling loss little question lingers inside the collective conscience of this Canadian staff, which is why it was so necessary for the Olympic champions to return to their roots on Friday with a stellar defensive show. 

“We put lots of consideration on the mindset as a result of I felt that was missing and affected (the staff) within the World Cup. I instructed them to go on the market right this moment and, at the beginning, present that this staff’s character is again. The soccer will handle itself. We’ve been working exhausting on the pitch on that area,” Priestman stated. 

“But I felt the most important thing — to come to Jamaica, home crowd, they’re the team that’s been riding high — is our character had to shine through. And I’m over the moon because I feel like it did.” 

John Molinaro is without doubt one of the main soccer journalists in Canada, having coated the sport for over 20 years for a number of media retailers, together with Sportsnet, CBC Sports and Sun Media. He is presently the editor-in-chief of TFC Republic, a web site devoted to in-depth protection of Toronto FC and Canadian soccer. TFC Republic could be discovered right here.