We deserved to win.

There is no ambiguity. There is no “if only”. Yes, our finishing was wasteful, but it was also extraordinarily unlucky, with McKenna, Johnson, Simpson, and Hutchinson missing by those fractions of an inch that no human being can control. Finishing is often a matter of fortune as much as talent, and today fortune was not with us.

Javier Aguirre, meanwhile, refereed the match and is now a first-ballot Benito Archundia Hall-of-Famer. Supporters greeted his appointment as match official with horror after he turned the Mexico – Panama group match into one of the most ridiculous games ever witnessed on a pitch, and our scepticism turned out to be justified. I don’t think he was on the take. This wasn’t a fix, this was just utter ineptitude of the sort that shakes nations. A cynic would point out that Aguirre is Salvadoran and had an axe to grind against Canada, but I doubt that was the issue.

We saw it between Mexico and Panama, and we saw it again. Aguirre is just an idiot.

The penalty was bogus, of course. Yes, Stalteri and Martinez were hand-jostling, with each getting a piece of each other for intervals. Stalteri was no more guilty than Martinez was and, frankly, Martinez wasn’t guilty at all: such jockeying is an accepted part of the game, appeared many more times in the match whenever Canada slung a cross or a corner into the Honduran area, and is legal. The ball did not strike Stalteri’s hand, either. it was a ridiculous decision and one that Aguirre, who was forty to fifty yards behind the play on account of poor positioning or poor conditioning, was in no position to call.

I was a defender for almost every match of my footballing career, so I may have a bit of a bias here. But, frankly, if I got a call like the one Stalteri took, I would not have ended up with just a yellow card. I would have blacked out and come to thirty minutes later surrounded by shocked teammates and with my hands covered in blood. They would use up all the ink in the universe to write out the number of games I should be suspended for.

Aguirre was the story. He was not biased towards Honduras, he was just an idiot. Canada got a foul out of a flagrant dive by Will Johnson that probably got him an honourary Honduran passport. Being scumbags with greased boots, the Hondurans dived much more and were rewarded for their dishonestly accordingly. Moreover, late in the match, a Honduran whose name eludes me dove spectacularly even for a Honduran. He rolled around on the ground and cried and clutched every one of his limbs. Play went on, with Honduras initially on the attack before giving the ball up. Canada went the other way. This took about a minute and a half, before Aguirre whistled the play dead.

What?

There’s no provision for a referee to do that! It was the most bizarre decision since an MLS referee decided that the away team needed a water break. Canada had uncontested possession and was starting a build up, and suddenly tweet, this Honduran needs his mommy. A drop ball was then awarded – in short, Canada was stripped of possession because of an uncalled dive over a minute before. You’re not going to believe this, but a dash of the magic spray and the Honduran turned out to be absolutely fine.

At least with the penalty, there’s an entry in the Laws of the Game saying “if there’s a foul or hand ball in the box, it’s a penalty”. That decision by Aguirre was a complete non-sequitur.

Canada bossed Honduras by at least as much as they slapped Jamaica around in Carson. But in Carson we had the American referee Terry Vaughn, and in Philadelphia we had this jackass. And that’s your game.

I’m calling it two and a half matches. Effort counts for half a point.

However many you want to say I attended, the point is that unless I find an envelope filled with hundred-dollar bills my role in the Gold Cup is over. I’m currently sitting in Vancouver International Airport, killing time until five in the morning when I can head down to the ferry terminal and make my way back home. Once I’m in Victoria I will, of course, catch Canada’s remaining matches at the Bard and Banker downtown, but it won’t be the same.

There were good times at the Gold Cup. In Los Angeles, I was up to spend $26 American on two beers (really) when a large group of El Salvadorans accosted me. Lacking any batteries or flares to throw, I had little choice but to relate to these fans as human beings.

Unfortunately, they didn’t speak English and I don’t speak Spanish. They were quite enthusiastic about my Canada kit, and we blathered at each other in mutual incomprehension until they hit upon the universal language.

“Canada, win! Jamaica, lose!” the lead El Salvadoran said.

“Si!” I responded enthusiastially.

We high-fived.

I probably should have just got used to dealing with El Salvadorans, actually.

Another running trend was nobody having any idea that the Gold Cup was on. In Los Angeles, the cab driver that picked myself and another Voyageur up directly in front of the Home Depot Center wasn’t aware the Gold Cup was on (apparently he just cruises downtown Carson at ten in the evening?). In Columbus, home of the Best Fans in MLS(tm), people looked at me like I was insane whenever I wore my Canada kit and reacted to the knowledge of international football in their community with shock. Only in Miami did I meet somebody with a hint of awareness: the shuttle driver who picked me up at the airport reacted with joy when he heard I was there for football. “Ah, Copa d’Oro!” he said – he actually spoke great English but for whatever reason it was the “Copa d’Oro” to him.

I mentioned that he was the first outsider who had any idea the tournament was going on. He replied that he was Colombian, so he had quite an attachment to the beautiful game.

“Oh, yeah, Colombia!” I said excitedly. “I remember, we kicked your ass in 2000!”

Judging by the ill expression on his face, he remembered too.

Also, I spent a lot of time getting lost. In Los Angeles I held up my end of the navigational bargain but the Los Angeles county transit departments thought that schedules were a nice theory but unworkable in practice and did their own thing entirely, leaving me to walk about four and a half kilometers in the blazing California sun to just meet the Voyageurs in the pub.

In Columbus, I took a bus down to the pub but did the responsible thing and hitched a ride with some other Voyageurs to get to the game. Knowing that Crew Stadium was “north”, we drove way the hell up the highway and were halfway to Cleveland before it occured to us to check a map. Also, one of the guys in the car was the guy who had to claim the tickets, so everybody else got to wait out in front until we showed up.

In Miami, well, you heard about that one already.

I met a lot of cool people, re-met a few more, and got stuck in a cab with a couple real dullards but I was drunk so that was okay. I did not get to lob a single bottle full of urine, which speaks volumes about the fans I encountered. The El Salvadorans were everywhere but they were interested in a good game and a good time, not in causing trouble. There were no Jamaicans to speak of and the Ticos I missed, which is a good thing since I would have gotten liquored up, yelled “REMEMBER SWANGARD!” and ended up with a Miami cop kneeling on my head. It was a much more positive experience than, to pick something at random, World Cup qualifying in Montreal.

I wrote a 1,200-word article on watching a USL-1 match, because I was bored and had no Internet access. If you stuck me in a hotel which charged $10 a day for Internet access and then let me out after a week, I’d have written a post about Charles Gbeke the length of War and Peace, except not proofread.

I sweated a lot. Los Angeles and Miami are so hot and humid that by the end of this tournament even Ali Gerba will be thin.

I didn’t order room service once. I did, however, eat at Burger King three times.

Why did I do it? Because Canada won’t play another meaningful match until 2011, that’s why. So I figured, enjoy the good times while they last. I’d say I’d do it again, but next time I’ll buy maps before I walk to the stadium.

May 27, 2000.

That was the date on which the Canadian men’s national team last won its fourth game in a row. It took place at Varsity Stadium in Toronto, and Canada dropped Trinidad and Tobago 1-0 in a friendly thanks to a goal from Jeff Clarke, his first and it turned out last with the national team.

A friendly win wasn’t all that remarkable, of course. What was remarkable were the three games we won before it: the quarterfinal, semifinal, and final of the 2000 CONCACAF Gold Cup. Now we have once again won four on the trot for the first time in almost a decade, and once again the Gold Cup is our vehicle to do it.

I’m taking a long time to start talking about the match. I think I’m afraid that if I think too hard about it, it’ll turn out to be a dream. Good christ. If Canada played more matches like that we’d have run out of room on the south side of Crew Stadium for our championship banners. I don’t care what the scoreline said: we always had an element of control in the match and it never truly seemed like it would slip from our grasp. Of course we were terrified in the supporters’ section, but that’s because we’re Canada fans, not because Canada didn’t deserve to win going away.

Full credit to the Salvadorans. They played us every bit as hard as they played Costa Rica (their support was incredibly numerous in Columbus as well). We just played them harder.

Our midfield, which I harped on in my Jamaica review, came through in fine style. There were no passengers. Will Johnson created a couple of glorious chances, one of which he just missed burying in the second half, and was a thorn in the side of El Salvador the whole match. Josh Simpson wasn’t as electrifying as he was in Los Angeles but he was reliable, occasionally spectacular, and discharged his responsibilities. Patrice Bernier made the goal, missed a sitter, and was in the right position so often it was like he’d come back in time and knew which plays El Salvador would try. Johnson and Simpson were both playing forward a lot and were strikers on paper, but their role turned more into attacking wingers particularly late in the match.

And Julian De Guzman. And Atiba Hutchinson. Well. In my preview post, I said they ought to be the best players on the pitch. They were. Julian’s fro apparently gives him super powers, and if he’s trying to impress a club in Europe he couldn’t have done a better job. Atiba got a nice chunk of glass for being the official man of the match, and his attacking runs were almost embarrassing for the Salvadorans, who were left with no answer. On one occasion in the second half Atiba made a move, missed it, and got stripped of the ball. I remember the Salvadoran midfielder – don’t remember which one, I had a bit of beer in me by this time – charging up the pitch, trying to play it through, losing it to a Hutchinson who had charged back to defend like his hair was on fire, and the Salvadoran wearing the most perfect “where the fuck did he come from?” expression I have seen in some time.

The backline was less dominant than they were against Jamaica, but there’s no shame in that and there were no errors, aside from Stalteri getting a yellow on a blatant dive by the Salvadoran (Klukowski’s yellow was both deserved and a good play on his part to stop a chance). I am nursing a massive mancrush on Dejan Jakovic, who was the star of the defense once again and is still only twenty-three years old. This will end in an embarrassingly complimentary chant, I’m sure.

And today was a milestone in one other regard. Ali Gerba is now tied for fourth all-time on Canada’s goalscoring list with fifteen senior goals. The man he is tied with is an obscure Toronto midfielder by the name of Dwayne De Rosario, who you may recall opted to stay home from this tournament. I get the impression that De Rosario isn’t going to pass Gerba again, either.

Below: the banners on the Voyageurs section, as seen at halftime from the north end. Click for a larger image.

Fresh off the redeye from Los Angeles to Columbus, and bits of me are scattered across every American airport from the west coast to Atlanta, Georgia. I flew from Los Angeles to Columbus via Atlanta! If the CSA lived up to their usual standard and sent the boys commercial, they’re probably sitting in the hotel restaurant staring at plates of eggs and nursing hangovers the size of Landon Donovan’s ego.

Flying in the United States is just the worst. The worst. Any Canadian players who have fallen onto this page: I have new respect for you guys. I feel like I just played ninety minutes plus stoppages against El Salvador by myself (I did not win).

Luckily, El Salvador had to make the same trip, and their federation isn’t known for being flush with cash. There were some folks with big bags in front of me at LAX: they may have been stowing El Salvadoran players in the cargo hold to save on airfare. Say what you will about the brutal travel and a schedule that seems like it was composed by Chuck Blazer in the midst of a particularly forgettable bender, at least every team in every group is getting the same treatment.

Unfortunately, I am scared to death of El Salvador in any stadium. I had the privilege of watching El Salvador dismantle Costa Rica, and the comparison to Canada could not have been more striking. Canada was as fundamentally sound but unexceptional, with next-to-no creativity apart from Josh Simpson and the audacious connection between Klukowski and Gerba for the goal. Few mistakes were made, except for Greg Sutton’s well-documented distribution problems and a couple ill-conceived giveaways early in the second half. Canada was the better team on the night but it could have easily – so easily – been 2-1 to Jamaica after ninety minutes.

El Salvador was taking a few liberties and lost the ball on occasion. But on balance they were flying, and they were doing so against an intensely skilled Costa Rica lineup fielding their B+ squad. Yes, they had the Carson crowd behind their backs; about 26,000 fans of whom 25,500 were there for El Salvador, but if they’d come out against Canada in that form they’d have ripped us to shreds. I don’t think the Columbus crowd will be quite so partisan, but the Voyageurs numbers are estimated at fifteen and you’ll be able to push me over with a feather if El Salvador’s ultras don’t beat that by a factor of ten.

A few months ago, I thought El Salvador would struggle to beat Jamaica. Now, I’ll be surprised if they don’t win the group.

At every position (except possibly goal), Canadian players are more skilled than their El Salvadoran counterparts, but that’s been true for a decade against most of CONCACAF’s sides and it’s hasn’t got us many points. Except against the United States and Mexico, Atiba Hutchinson and Julian De Guzman ought to be the most talented players on any pitch yet it never works out. When our stars put together their best matches this team is a contender in CONCACAF. In the 2006 friendly against Brazil and the 2007 Gold Cup against the United States, Canada went toe-to-toe with a strong Brazil B team and the Americans’ best eleven and were up to the challenge. Those performances come too seldom.

But there is one bright spot. Both of those matches were under our Tobagan titan, Stephen Hart.

Hart’s shown the ability to get close to the best out of these players. Our one real Canadian-style submission was in 2007 in an ultimately meaningless loss to Guadeloupe and we came back admirably from that. El Salvador is a nothing country with a historically unsuccessful team and they’re underdogs to Canada according to the online bookies. But they’re also in the hex and have been getting better results than us against better opposition. If Hart can convince them to take El Salvador seriously, a victory is in the offing.

I can’t predict a Canadian win. I just can’t. El Salvador’s form is better, El Salvador’s support will be better, and I don’t think Canada has won four matches in a row in my lifetime. I’m saying El Salvador 2, Canada 1 (Gerba), Canadian supporters tased 3, heads knelt on by enthusiastic Columbus cops 5.

Of course, even a loss leaves Canada in a good position. Beat Costa Rica in Miami or and we’re through; draw and we’re probably through anyway. But, if the stars align (in every sense), it could be glorious tonight.

Did you listen to the excellent Stephen Hart post-game press conference at http://www.youtube.com/thevoyageurs? If not, you really should have. There were a number of great questions, including one about the somewhat surprising decision to start Greg Sutton over Josh Wagenaar on Friday.

Hart indicated that the coaching staff and he thought that Sutton would have an advantage against Jamaica’s primarily aerial attack and skill on set pieces. Well, Sutton looked a little rusty but was quite good and earned his clean sheet, so we can’t fault Hart’s logic (in particular, Sutton was an assassin on corner kicks). I’ve criticized Hart in the past but he made the right moves on Friday and I’m getting more respect for him with every match.

I also got a good look at El Salvador when they took on Costa Rica. The Ticos know a thing or two about possession football but for the first hour El Salvador damned near ran them off the pitch. El Salvador had essentially a home crowd behind them but they also had bags of skill and showed it off at every opportunity. Like Canada they were sloppy at times, but unlike Canada they seemed a threat to score every time they got possession.

A few months ago I predicted El Salvador would be the minnows of Group A, but my god! If Canada had taken on El Salvador last night we’d be shoveling bits of Kevin McKenna off the grass. To stop an attack like that, you need a quick midfield (which Canada can have if they play like they should), a determined defense (which Canada has in trumps and showed off against Jamaica), and a spritely goalkeeper who can make the acrobatic reflex save, which Greg Sutton emphatically is not.

So which goalkeeper will start against El Salvador? In his press conference, Hart insisted that both goalkeepers trained well and he played Sutton for tactical reasons. Well, in Columbus tactical considerations will demand Wagenaar. A win will punch Canada’s ticket to the quarterfinals and a draw will still leave them in control of their own destiny, so Tuesday will not be a day for complacency.

However, I bet that Hart will start Sutton. Stephen Hart can play favourites. Richard Hastings shouldn’t get an international cap from anywhere but the CSA store at this stage in his career, yet he’s on the team. Starting the aging and rapidly deteriorating McKenna without even giving the in-season and in-form Andre Hainault a look sent another signal. Hart is more resistant to habit than most managers (he has embraced Dejan Jakovic and Simeon Jackson almost immediately), but he’s not immune. And when the goalkeeper you like has a solid game, as Sutton did, it becomes awfully easy to make excuses.

I don’t think Sutton would do badly. But he wouldn’t be the best choice, either.

I am sitting in my hotel room with a cup of awful Complimentary In-Room Coffee beside me. My Canada shirt lies discarded on the table where I threw it just before I collapsed into the arms of Morpheus. I pretty much have to try and sum up last night, don’t I?

It was awful. I got up at 4 AM in my apartment in Esquimalt and set off for the Victoria airport. My flight was early enough that I had to walk a long way since the buses weren’t running yet. I flew in a cramped, unpleasant Dash 8-100 to Vancouver and then sat on the worst seat in the world for the flight to LA – a flight that was late enough for me to miss my bus that would get me to the Red Car Pub, where the Voyageurs were meeting pregame.

Since Voyageurs member superbrad had my ticket, I really had to get to that pub.

I wasn’t doomed yet, though. If I hopped on the next available bus, I might just make it. Unfortunately that bus was also late, meaning I missed my connection and had to hike about four kilometers, through a city I’ve never been to, just in time to meet the other Voyageurs as they were standing, stretching, and paying the bill.

After all of that, it would take a lot for the game to be worth it. Luckily, it was.

The security at the Home Depot Center was abominable, and will serve for all time as a lesson in how not to run a soccer game, but the match itself was great, and not just because we won. Canada was playing a classic Canadian game, bending and flexing in all the wrong ways. With the exception of Will Johnson and later Josh Simpson, the midfield was poor all night, leading to a host of good Jamaican opportunities just hacked away by our backline or saved by Greg Sutton. Dejan Jakovic won himself a lot of fans last night: he was my man of the match and he was just invincible. At no point did Jamaica look like they were going to pull one over on that improbably brilliant 23-year-old MLS rookie. Paul Stalteri… well, by now we know what we get from him. He was in match shape, unlike in World Cup qualifying, and with his legs under him he was the old Diesel we all know and love. He was so far superior to Jamaica’s strikeforce I almost felt bad for them.

McKenna struggled a bit at times but was generally reliable. Klukowski was his old, exceptional crossing self, but I thought he was a bit sloppy in his own half last night, with the Jamaican passes skinning him a couple of times for good opportunities.

But De Jong and Hutchinson, and to a lesser extent De Guzman, were invisible. It was ugly at times for them. The fact that we won anyway speaks volumes, and if nothing else it says once again that the boys play stronger as a team under Hart than they ever did under Mitchell.

I must bring up the Home Depot Center security once more, though. Individually, many of the guards were pretty good. The guard standing in front of the Voyageurs section was a big, older fella with a great big smile, a sense of humour, and a good eye for when to step in. But despite having our banners cleared weeks in advance by the Canadian Soccer Association, the Voyageur carrying them into the stadium was detained for ages by security while they tried to find someone to check the duffel bag. Then, when he finally got them into the stadium having missed the beginning of the match, we had another altercation when we actually tried to put them up. I, personally, despite holding a letter from CONCACAF saying that my camera was permitted inside, got the runaround for about fifteen minutes and went to three different parts of the stadium before I got in.

And when we were all inside, set up, and ready to go great guns, we were told to sit down. Sit down? At a CONCACAF Gold Cup match? We weren’t sitting in the $50 there-to-be-seen seats! We had to adapt on the fly to that. Couple new chants – “sit down, for the boys in red…”

Oh, and that same Voyageur who was detained with the banners? He got hassled by one guard with a stick up his ass, sent by the suits because he was blowing his whistle. As were about seventy other people, but strangely they were only worried about the Canadian.

So hooray for the game but if the Home Depot Center never hosts another CONCACAF event, they’ll still have hosted one too many.

And so are we at the Maple Leaf Forever. Tomorrow morning, my flight to Los Angeles takes off, and I’ll be rocking the Hardware Store in Carson, California for Canada – Jamaica (and maybe El Salvador – Costa Rica) with bloggin’ laptop in tow. I will then proceed to Columbus and Miami, presumably trailing a string of Voyageurs scarves and t-shirts for people in one city who want merchandise from people in another city.

It should be awesome, and there shall be pretty quick coverage on this site after each game, presuming I don’t get hammered after a 19-0 Canada victory (or a 1-0 Canada defeat). So stay tuned!

I’m not sure what my least favourite part of the Gold Cup is. It’s probably the omnipresent agony that is CONCACAF refereeing. Sometimes it’s seeing which major Canadian player will completely forget how to play this game. But right now, it’s probably the usual chorus of very intelligent, very well-read, very experienced Canadian football observers saying that the Gold Cup doesn’t matter.

This isn’t just the guys at TSN saying the Gold Cup is irrelevant because soccer is irrelevant. The 24th Minute’s Duane Rollins, as big a Canada fan as you’ll meet, seems to be treating the Gold Cup as a friendly schedule with a gaudy trophy at the end. Surf over to the Voyageurs board and see serious fans suggest lineups that stop barely short of including “this twelve-year-old across the street who can keepie uppie for, like, two hours and has a Honduran grandmother”.

You know what? Screw that. I’m not going to the Gold Cup because I feel sorry for it. The Gold Cup is CONCACAF’s championship, it’s the second-biggest tourmanent Canada’s men will ever be able to play for, and it’s a major event on our calendar for all the right reasons.

• It’s the only thing we’ve ever won. Canada is the only country that isn’t Mexico or the United States to ever win the CONCACAF Gold Cup. We and Costa Rica are also the only non-American, non-Mexican teams to win multiple CONCACAF championships in any incarnation. People gripe that football has no winning history in this country and then belittle the Gold Cup, which is the only winning history we’ve got.
• Adults play it. In 2003, Canada reached the quarterfinals of the then-World Youth Cup, scraping our way through wins and draws before finally losing. To Spain. In extra time. It was possibly the most improbable tournament in our history, and outside of the usual suspects nobody noticed. Canada fans will turn out when we host a youth tournament, but when it’s happening in some far-flung corner of the globe nobody will remember the results.
• People pay attention when we win anything. Am I the only one who remembers this? When Craig Forrest spent two glorious weeks as the best goalkeeper in the world and an underskilled bunch of European rejects took the 2000 title with nothing more than grit, determination, a great manager and a lucky coin toss, people around the country cared. The sorts of people who went down to the pub yesterday to watch Manchester United – Barcelona without even knowing Vancouver – Montreal was happening. Canada, normally the doormats of CONCACAF (or so the casuals can be forgiven for believing), had told the Americans, the Mexicans, and those bastards the Hondurans where they could shove their tradition. And then we flamed out of the 2002 World Cup qualifying season in spectacular fashion even for us, and that was that.
• Maybe if we sucked less, Canadians would actually play for Canada. You’re David Hoilett. You can play for either Canada or Jamaica. Neither team is in the hex, but the Gold Cup comes, Jamaica sends a real lineup, and Canada sends kids. We play July 3 in Los Angeles, and Jamaica just rolls us. David Edgar misses the rest of the tournament with windburn because he got blown by so many times, that kind of thing. Jamaica ends up losing the final to the Americans, Canada ends up golfing. The next FIFA date, both Jamaica and Canada call you. Are you going to go play for the team that wants to win games, or the team whose motto is Latin for “wait until next year”? The whole reason Owen Hargreaves and Jonathan De Guzman went to England and the Netherlands was because they could win trophies there. Want to solve that problem? Win some trophies.
• Nobody learns from losing. When I was a youth player, I was a midfielder on the championship team from St. Albert, Alberta. We weren’t at the elite level but we were up there a bit, and let me tell you, that team was a cocky bunch. We even added a couple ringers; top players from other teams in the city. We went down to Calgary and you could take home the games we won in a matchbox without taking the matches out first. I broke my right wrist in our second-last game, played the last game anyway because we were all in the sort of suicidal despair that numbs mere physical pain, and we lost something like 15-0. I kicked a kid in the testicles just so I could get my foot on some sort of ball. Did that make us better players? Hell no, it just made us want to come back next year a lot less. We should probably try and avoid that with our national team.
• Let’s Face It, Winning Is Just Nails. If we named a bunch of thirty-somethings, went down to the States and won this thing, I bet nobody would be complaining then.

Reducing our calendar to “World Cup qualifying” and “friendlies with fancy names” is not the way to build football in this country. There aren’t a lot of opportunities for us to win silverware and show the public that Canada takes the sport seriously, so let’s not belittle the ones we have.

Dave Hoilett has been knocked out (German) of the rest of the German 2.Bundesliga season with a broken toe, sustained earlier today in 1-0 loss for his FC St. Pauli side.

This is obvious a serious damper on our hopes of getting Hoilett a cap in the Gold Cup. A broken toe isn’t a hugely serious injury and Hoilett could be back in July if he really wanted to, but is someone with his history of national ambivalence going to put himself through pain in order to wear the maple leaf? I’m not holding my breath.

That said, the Hoilett saga is at the point where, if I’m Stephen Hart, I’d name Hoilett and put him out in the 90th minute sometime just to get him capped if he was willing to come. But coming on the heels of hopeful comments from Hart on It’s Called Football a couple of weeks ago about getting Hoilett a senior cap, this is seriously disappointing. Hopefully the Jamaicans are so disspirited by this minor injury that they never call him again.

On Thursday, we finally got the draw for the 2009 CONCACAF Gold Cup, taking place this July in pretty well the entire continental United States (for 2011, Jack Warner is supposedly trying to schedule a date on Jupiter).

Well, when I say “draw”, I overstate the case somewhat.

“We’re excited at having created these groups. They are well-balanced and will provide very interesting matches,” CONCACAF general secretary Chuck Blazer said. “Given the variety of teams and the cities we’re going to, it offers something for everyone.” (Canwest News Service)

In what I’m sure is unrelated news, the Americans and Mexicans have cotton-candy hugs-and-kisses draws whereas Canada is drawn against Costa Rica, Jamaica, and El Salvador. You can make an argument that three of the six strongest sides in CONCACAF are in one group but, hey, at least those honest souls at CONCACAF think the matches will be “very interesting”.

But I digress.

Canada will travel a combined distance, stadium to stadium, of 4,787.67 kilometres during the group stage according to Google Earth, from the west coast of the United States in Los Angeles to the southeastern tip in Miami, passing through almost the geographical centre of the country in Columbus en route. Their opponents in the group will suffer the same trials, but it’s almost like they wanted to soften up Group A so that the United States and Mexico wouldn’t have any trouble…no, what an absurd concept.

We’re in the Group of Death, but there is opportunity here. Canada was the better team when we played Jamaica at BMO Field during World Cup qualifying and drew only due to a single Pat Onstad gaffe. El Salvador are far and away the weak sisters of the group, so that means that whether we can beat the Ticos in Miami is largely a matter of pride and a favourable quarterfinal draw.

I’m not going to lie to you. I think we can make it.

Costa Rica’s the class of the group, obviously. They’re the role models for having a strong domestic league. Their roster consists of the occasional foreign star, such as Carlos Hernández of the Los Angeles Galaxy, but they’re padded with a bunch of guys you’ve never heard of from the Costa Rican league. C.D. Deportivo Saprissa contributed four players for their last match against Mexico, including their most-capped player and top scorer, midfielder Walter Centeno. When was the last time you saw a C.D. Deportivo Saprissa match?

But the Ticos keep doing it. They’ve qualified three times for the World Cup, including twice consecutively, and they’re favourites to make it three in a row. My god. It’s almost like having domestic and near-domestic players who can play with and against each other on a regular basis leads to having a superior team. Which is why I’ve always felt that you should cheer for every Canadian club except when they’re playing against your own side. If we can get three MLS entries by 2012, that’s a total of fifteen Canadians required to be on MLS rosters plus those who succeed on their own merits around the league.

Be like Costa Rica, is what I’m saying. Considering how easy travel is when you don’t need to recall players from aroudn the globe I’d be stunned if they didn’t send their best team to the Gold Cup, and that means they can book a trip to either Philadelphia or Dallas in pen. We play Costa Rica July 10 in Miami, our last match of the group stage. Later that night Jamaica plays El Salvador, and since we can probably predict how both of those matches will turn out without even seeing the rosters, let’s cross our fingers that we’re qualified before kickoff.

Jamaica’s more-or-less in Canada’s boat. They were kicked out of World Cup qualifying in inglorious fashion and they’re playing their first match of 2009 with a different manager than the one who managed the beginning of 2008. They’re going to be burning for a big Gold Cup, and they’re going to look at their strong group as nothing less than an appropriate challenge. They’re probably going to combine young players (hopefully not Dave Hoilett!) and veterans to prepare for 2014.

Yes, they beat the hell out of us in Kingston in our last match, but by then Canada was out and playing nobodies (remember the Kevin Harmse Experience, everybody?) while Jamaica still had everything to play for. And we could easily have reversed the scoreline in Toronto, but Ricketts was solid and Onstad, er, wasn’t. Well, you can bet that the Reggae Boyz won’t have old man Onstad around to help them out this time.

I’m an optimist. I think that Jamaica’s overall skill level is below ours. I think that our best players wallop their best players and we take our roster filler from MLS and the USL Division One whereas the Jamaican Digicel Premier League just stinks. If we play Jamaica ten times we should win five of them and draw three more. There’s more grassroots support for soccer in Canada, more high-level support for soccer in Canada, more everything for soccer in Canada, and if we haven’t got the results against Jamaica lately then, well, let’s just hope that whoever our new manager is can put a game together.

We open our tournament in Los Angeles against Jamaica on July 3. There’s a fairly strong contingent of western Voyageurs already committed to this match, so hopefully the boys can get us off on the right foot. Canada – Jamaica will clearly be the vital match of the group: with Costa Rica nearly certain for qualification and El Salvador so far below our calibre, it’s almost certain that the winner of that match will go through.

El Salvador is the “and the rest!” of Group A. They’ve made it to two World Cups (though none since 1982) and they’re a very credible team capable of shocking anybody in CONCACAF if they play their best match. Essentially the entire El Salvador squad plays in their premier league, so they’re as familiar with each other as it’s possible to be. They’re a legitimate footballing nation with pedigree up the rear and they’re stunning in World Cup qualifying, getting through to the hex, achieving a 2-2 draw at home to the United States, and showing magnificent style losing 1-0 in Costa Rica. But they’re just not that good, their players are of strictly local calibre, and they’ve somehow contrived to be lower in the FIFA rankings than Canada is. In the previous World Cup qualifying round, El Salvador’s Group 3 was laughably bad, boasting minnows Haiti and Suriname along with Costa Rica.

But I’m not looking past them. We play El Salvador July 7 at Crew Stadium in Columbus (plenty of Toronto Voyageurs signing up for a bus trip, which should be fun) and I’m terrified. You can bet that Columbus football fans won’t have fond memories of Toronto FC and might well be in El Salvador’s corner. When the schedule came out, I circled July 7 as “The Sort of Game Canada Loses”. If we play our best match we will win barring intervention from the football gods.

God, I hope we play our best match.

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