Front Burner - Canada’s road to the World Cup

Episode Date: November 19, 2021

Canada’s men’s soccer team is closer to going to the World Cup tournament than it has been in decades, after a historic win against heavyweight team Mexico. The last time they qualified was in 1986. They didn’t score a single goal. But now with coaching from John Herdman and star players like Alphonso Davies, the team has started to believe in itself — and this week, won an important qualifying event against Mexico. After scoring their second goal, team members leaped into a snowbank in the –10 C Edmonton weather to celebrate. This iconic moment comes only a few months after Canada’s women won their first Olympic gold for soccer in Tokyo. Shireen Ahmed is a regular contributor to TSN, and a co-host of the Burn It All Down podcast. Today, she takes us through the game, what it means for Canada, and what comes next for soccer in this country.

In the Dragon's Den, a simple pitch can lead to a life-changing connection. Watch new episodes of Dragon's Den free on CBC Gem. Brought to you in part by National Angel Capital Organization, empowering Canada's entrepreneurs through angel investment and industry connections. This is a CBC Podcast. Hi, I'm Angela Starrett. The last time Canada's men's soccer team went to the World Cup was in 1986. The Beastie Boys were still recording Fight For Your Right.

The Oprah Winfrey Show hadn't yet debuted. Waterbeds were still cornering the mattress industry. Now, 35 years later, Canada is fighting to return to that moment. This week, Canada's men beat Mexico at a World Cup qualifying game, winning 2-1 in minus 10 degrees Celsius at Edmonton's Commonwealth Stadium. Now, this doesn't mean we're on a path to victory just yet. This is just one of several qualifying events, but it's still a huge deal for a lot of fans. Shireen Ahmed is a contributor to TSN, and she's the co-host of Burn It All Down, the podcast. Today, she'll explain how soccer has found the spotlight and what

that tells us about how Canada is changing. Hi, Shereen. Hi, Angela. Thank you for having me. I mean, this is kind of going off script, but just before we get into the actual game itself, a friend of mine sent me a view of the stadium with the snow. And I know a lot of people were looking at that site with sort of like fear and trepidation, but also excitement. What went through your mind when you saw those shots of that snowy stadium field? I was like, can this actually be more Canadian? Soccer and snow makes sense to me.

I've played soccer my whole life, and I've played in frost, I've played in snow, played in mud. The elements play a part of this game, and I have always felt like the football goddesses enjoy this. And they put forth and they conspire with the weather to bring forth something entertaining, be it heat, be it rain, be it sleet. I can feel it. One of the main reasons why I did not put my son into hockey. I was like, I'm not doing this at four in the morning. Tell me about the moments when you saw the snow and the minus 10 degree temperatures start to impact the gameplay? Well, if we sort of look at the game as a whole, I mean, there weren't a whole bunch of shots on that. And that makes sense, despite just dynamic stretching and warming up for the team. It takes

a while. It actually takes a while. I don't even think Mexico had a shot on that for a really long time in the first half. But what ends up happening is we see the difference between the two teams come forth really quickly. Did you feel that the call did play into Canada's hands a bit? Absolutely. No one wants to play in that, especially the Mexicans. I said this. I've seen them at the 60th minute.

They looked like they were asking themselves that question. How, you know, within the first part, it was 2-0 Canada, but also even how the Canadian players were more comfortable more quickly, had eased into the game and started their passing and completion. I mean, the second goal, you know, honestly, by Carl-Aaron, was off of stopped play and then off his foot. And that's really interesting because to know where you have to be in those conditions on that pitch that is arguably cold and wet, also it's astroturf, it's not grass,

and the control of the ball and the way the ball bounces definitely differs. And Mexico is absolutely at a disadvantage not having the amount of play. Mexico is absolutely at a disadvantage not having the amount of play. I mean, a couple of Canadian players, including Atiba Hutchinson, also play in Turkey where there can be a lot of frost. And I think that's important to keep in mind that the skills that they have have actually came into play during this game. Alphonso Davies plays in Germany. But all of these players growing up having played in Canada

have arguably played in the snow. Like Alphonso Davies, when he came to Canada, he was a former refugee. He was from Edmonton. There's no doubt in my mind he knows how to do this. I will say this, that the last 10 minutes of the game were incredible. And at that point, you realize that Mexico has not only warmed up sufficiently, but are continuously attacking. Canada needs to defend. Bustelous across. It's inside the sixth. It's cleared out.

And so, you know, props to them for continuing to keep attacking into extra time of the second half, because that's what they were doing. But it took them that long to be able to match the speed and the pace and the of the Canadians yeah and I guess some people are saying you know the weather had this huge part of of Canada's win but I mean tell me what we saw on the pitch what were the moments that made you think you know wow we really have a powerful team here yeah I don't know if I would say it was the elements that did this. I think the squad actually did this. I think the roster is very powerful. I think John Herdman, their coach since 2018,

has found a recipe of chemistry, and we saw that. For me, the most heart-stopping moment is definitely an extra time when Borjan saved the shot on the line. Deliver it! And it's not in extra time when Borjian saved the shot on the line. And it's not in! Pushed out! Borjian said no. There were, you know, the Mexican team, the tricolor, meaning tricolored, were absolutely in our 18-yard box. They were attacking till the end.

I was extremely nervous because it's like they had suddenly figured out how to be cohesive very quickly. So I was very nervous. So Borjan saving this said, okay, he's still on fire. He is still in absolute like mode. And the goalkeeper is the last defender is the last line of defense. And he was, so for me, nothing stands out more than that safe. Cause I would have completely, I'm an anxious mess anyway when I watch sports. I would have lost it completely. So that was the first thing. The second thing is Johnson's assist to Kyle Lahren's goal, the first one.

Mr. Johnson has a strike. He'll show Spills. Lahren! Goal! I love that. And Kyle Lowry is not the most prominent player. Alphonso Davies arguably is the most prominent player on that squad. So it was really nice to see Lowry, who is from Brampton originally, get that beautiful goal. Yeah, and I want to talk a little bit more about the people

who make the game. Earlier, you were just talking about how this team was was gelling better than they had before. Wins against Mexico are few and far between by Canada. I mean, they played them 32 times since 1957. And this was only the fifth time that they beat them. And the first in 21 years and the first time on Canadian soil since 1990. And people are really pointing to coach John Herdman for building up this team and making it one that could play on the international stage. What is the story of how he did that? Well, I think John Herdman, for those that don't know, was actually the coach of the women's national soccer team and was with them for a successful medal performance in the Olympics in 2016 as well, but decided to step away and go to the men's team. But he has a way of understanding where the shortcomings are and then capitalizing on the strengths. are and then capitalizing on the strengths.

And John Herdman, from what I know, and I've interacted a lot with the women's players, you know, the Olympic champions, they speak very highly of him. And his approach is to understand individual skill, but then build it as a collective. And I believe that's what he's done here. Really proud of the lads, proud of the performance. These boys bought into it. It took them time to recognize that, you know, we're for real. It's for real.

But they've built a foundation here that they'll fight and they'll work for each other. And when that's there, the talent comes out. So that's great. It's brilliant. And I want to talk about Atiba. Atiba Hutchinson is one of the players who has said Herdman really helped the team believe in themselves. And that probably came at an important time, given that in 2016, Hutchinson was thinking about not even trying for the World Cup anymore. What have we seen from him in the past few years? Hutchinson has a history of playing overseas. He played in Denmark and, you know, now he captains, actually he's captain of this squad,

but also captain of, you know, Betzikas in Turkey. Confidence plays a huge role. And I think that we don't see that. So the role of a coach to foster that self-confidence and belief in oneself and the idea that, you know, I see this for you i see you being champions can we visualize it and visualization is an important tool that coaches often use and you know i think we don't this is a really important conversation and you know hutchinson is incredibly honest and vulnerable when he talks about this is that we don't often think as male

athletes having this type of vulnerability it's hard it's. It's been a long road. I didn't think I could, you know, get this many games and get to this point. But yeah, it's an amazing accomplishment. Where that confidence is missing as an individual, but also as a squad. And for John Herdman to come back and again, look at the individual skills, but look how they are as a unit is huge and we've seen that you're seeing that joy on the pitch that's one of the other things i noticed was how exciting this match was riveting the players and i'll be quite frank with you canadian men's soccer has not been that exciting for me in fact i have paid very little attention to it in the last eight years but now it's sort of like what what? What's happening here? Oh, this is exciting.

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You mentioned Alfonso Davies earlier, one of the star players on the team. And what Tuesday night would have been like for him, given that he grew up in Edmonton? What's his backstory? Alphonso Davies is an incredible young man. He's really humble. He plays with Bayern Munich, which is a team in Germany, and they won the Champs League trophy,

which is one of the most prestigious leagues in world global football. He is a former refugee, and he's been one of the faces of a campaign to support and draw attention and raise awareness about refugees in the world, not only in the sports sphere, but just generally. You know, I think that it's really important to remember that we're not trying to foster this idea of the good immigrant, which happens quite often, that we should give chances to only specific people. His point is, we should give chances to only specific people. His point is we should give chances to everybody.

My name is Alfonso Davies. My parents are from Liberia and fled the civil war. I was born in Ghana in a refugee camp. It was a hard life. But when I was five years old, a country called Canada welcomed us in. And what do you think it means for Canadian soccer that the young people are able to see so many different people's experiences and stories like this out on the field? Well, I think this is definitely led by the players themselves. I think that, I mean, Alphonso Davies is 21.

He's very, very young, but he's navigating the world in a place where conversations about racial justice and global conflict and ideas of whether it's anti-Blackness or anti-indigeneity are very common for people that age. I mean, the discussions that youth are having, arguably, I don't know what happens in their locker room, but in other locker rooms that I'm, you know, privy to, those type of discussions certainly happen. And the women's team, if you use an example again, are very clear on what their priorities are. You know, talking about anti-oppression lenses, they wear, they wore colors of orange to raise awareness for, you know, the victims of residential schools in this country and the history and not messing around the fact that this country actually has a very brutal

history of genocide against Indigenous folks. And the fact that the women do this, the men aren't there yet. They're not. And this doesn't surprise me because I often feel that in sports spaces, women lead. And I want to talk more about the women who've paved the way in soccer. And you mentioned before the women's team and how they've been navigating a lot of the wins while speaking up on social issues. And they just won Olympic gold in Tokyo. I reported on that. I spoke to Julio Grosso's dad, which was super exciting. Julio Grosso's dad, which was super exciting. Watching it live in the studio as well, winning in penalty kicks.

The substitute for Canada just about gets it through. It's a glory gold for Canada. Their first in the women's football at the Olympic Games after those back-to-back bronzes in London and Rio. Look at the release. Look at the celebrations after a stunning shootout. But you have said that they are leading, but are they also seeing some of this momentum we've been talking about in the sport?

Absolutely. I think that the Canadian women have dominated this space for a very long time, and we've been completely entranced and rightly so by that and they are very cognizant of social issues because it intertwines one of the things I recently broke the story before the victory tour that was in Ottawa and Montreal of the Canadian women's national team writing a letter to Soccer Canada and saying we have a list of demands and requests that we want an independent

investigation into the alleged, you know, abuse by Bob Berard, our former coach of the under-20 national program and with the Vancouver Whitecaps. And that case is currently in court. So they used a moment of joy and winning to redirect attention to what they feel is more important. Going back to men's soccer here, I mean, it's a long road to the World Cup for the men. What has to happen for us to get there now? In terms of the road, the actual pathway there, there's six games left and they're really difficult. So what happens in this, the

qualification for the World Cup can get a little complicated. It's like that GIF of Wynonna Ryder looking at math. That's kind of sometimes what it looks like. So really, so Canada will try and resume to get one of three direct births to the World Cup. And the fourth place team advances to a last chance playoff opportunity. So this is not going to be easy, which is why the momentum that's growing and building is going to be key here. So it's not as if we have qualified the World Cup yet. I do think we're well on our way to doing it. the World Cup yet. I do think we're well on our way to doing it. And do I think that fear has been instilled in other countries who may not necessarily have considered Canada a threat?

Yes. And what about if we do get there? Do you think we have a shot? I'm never going to say no. I'm a believer. Maybe the women maybe think that. I mean, I think that I've seen stories and the World Cup is so bizarre and so beautiful in so many ways. I'll talk about the football goddesses again. Sometimes they just want us to have things, but part of being devastated is part of the glory. Us getting eliminated from the World Cup, it drove the women's squad harder at the Olympics. Perhaps not having a chance to perform at the highest stage will give them the impetus to work even harder. I'm looking forward to it. For me, nothing ever

gets ruled out in football. Nothing gets ruled out. I've seen everything. I've seen teams that weren't supposed to win championships and tournaments, players that weren't supposed to be superstars just do something incredible. I mean, Julia Grosso, for example, who you spoke with, you know, like would we think that this entire thing was on her? Like would she have that moment? So I don't know. Well, Kyle Lahren comes out with a brace. Like I wouldn't have pegged Kyle Lahren to have a brace.

I would have thought it would have been Alfonso, you know? So we don't know. But what I will say is this. I'm really looking forward to the journey. Shereen, this has been absolutely incredible. I am so grateful that you've made this conversation so fun, so interesting and so informative. Thank you so much. Thank you for having me.

Thank you for having me. Before we go today, an update on the Belarus border crisis. Earlier this week, we did an episode about the plight of migrants from the Middle East camped out along the country's border with Poland. On Thursday morning, all the migrant camps were cleared by the Belarusian government. Officials in Minsk have not yet revealed where those migrants are now, though Belarusian state-run media reports that many have now been moved into a heated warehouse. Also on Thursday, hundreds of migrants from Iraq were flown home from Belarus, abandoning hopes of reaching the European Union.

That's all for this week. FrontBurner is brought to you by CBC News and CBC Podcasts. The show was produced this week by Simi Bassi, Imogen Burchard, Ali Janes, Katie Toth and Derek Our music is by The executive producer of Frontburner is I'm Angela Starrett, in for Jamie Poisson, and I'll be back with you again next week. Thanks so much for listening. For more CBC Podcasts, go to cbc.ca slash podcasts.