Alphonso Davies, shown arriving for Saturday's match against Morocco, didn't play in Canada's World Cup finale and was limited to one brief appearance in the tournament.Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images
Canada lost to Morocco on Saturday. Okay, fine. That was always likely to happen. The scoreline – 3-0 – reads worse than the game looked.
This was a talent-will-out sort of game. The Canadians were more aggressive, created twice as many opportunities and played with greater purpose overall. Morocco took a first-half coffee break, was laggardly in their approach throughout and had four decent chances the entire match. They scored on three and hit the crossbar on the other.
This game wasn’t proof that talent isn’t what really matters. It proved that it’s all that matters.
So why was Canada’s most talented player left on the bench? Because he “didn’t feel right.”
Canada’s World Cup journey ends with knockout loss to Morocco
According to Canadian coach Jesse Marsch, Alphonso Davies felt something in his injured hamstring either Friday or the day before (the coach contradicted himself in a pair of answers). The team had an MRI done. It was clear.
“He felt a little something. It turned out that it wasn’t anything significant, but he didn’t feel right and we didn’t want to stress it,” Marsch said. “Other than that, the progression and the routine that we put him through was really good, really disciplined.”
Davies tries to get limber in Houston.Kai Pfaffenbach/Reuters
Elsewhere, Marsch said it was “killing” Davies that he couldn’t play, and though he’d been written off for Saturday’s game, he tried to warm up at the half.
So it was killing him and he wanted to go, or it was his decision? Because those two things don’t go together.
This sounds like a player who expects the coach to cover for him, and a coach who is wiling to do that, but only to a point. Marsch repeatedly noting that the injury wasn’t “significant” seemed significant.
In the mixed zone, Davies said much the same thing, but left out the bit about the MRI. In his telling, it wasn’t his call. It was something he and Marsch decided on together – “we made the decision.”
“We want players on the pitch who are 100 per cent to play the game,” Davies said. Sure, but if it’s a choice between a 100 per cent Richie Laryea and a 70 per cent Davies with 15 minutes left in a game you must win, that’s not a choice. That’s an automatic.
One is left wondering what the actual purpose of bringing Davies was. Was it pure hopefulness? Was it to act as a “decoy” – Marsch’s strange assertion after the group phase? Was it so that BMO wouldn’t feel bad about making all those ad buys?
Because it demonstrably wasn’t something done in the expectation that Davies would be a difference maker. If you don’t play in an elimination game at the World Cup with your team down by one, after getting a clear MRI, then you didn’t want to.
Live analysis and commentary about Canada's tournament-ending loss
That’s fine. Nobody can or should make anyone do anything they don’t want to do.
However, if you want to be the face of the program, and are happy to take the opportunities that come with that, then you should be willing to take a few arrows for the team. You go out and play even though you’re hurting. Go half-speed if you must. Walk the ball up the field.
What Canada missed on the day wasn’t hard runners. It was ability near the opposing goal. Even on one leg, Davies might have provided that.
It’s a commentary on how unseriously soccer is still taken in this country that nobody seems too upset about it. Marsch was happy to answer a question about it once. The second time he seemed a bit taken aback. By the third, he was beginning to sound frustrated.
Marsch leaves the field at the end of the 3-0 loss to Morocco.David J. Phillip/The Associated Press
Were it a star hockey player – a game we do take seriously, and so have real expectations around – there would be no excuse good enough save catastrophic, MRI-confirmed injury.
And this isn’t a soccer thing. I am having a hard time believing that a semi-fit Lionel Messi could be prevented from coming on at the end of a World Cup game Argentina was losing, short of the coaching staff pinning him to the ground.
Obviously, there is some level of delusion permitted in the Canadian set-up. Fresh off the field, Marsch told TSN, “We were the better team …” – and listed all the ways in which that wasn’t really true, finishing with – “… otherwise, the game was ours.”
Elsewhere, the quote that will trail him out of this tournament: “I’d rather be us than them.”
This isn’t the Grade 8 talent show. It’s Broadway. Good enough isn’t good enough. That the guy in charge of the whole shooting match can’t bring himself to say that is an issue.
Canada’s problem isn’t trying hard. It’s finding players who can convert all that trying into goals. Banging on about a decent effort is great for supporters of the team, not coaches. They are meant to be ruthless, because their jobs depend on it. In Marsch’s case, his salary is guaranteed for another four years.
If he’d felt that his job was on the line in Houston, one wonders if he might have pushed Davies a little harder. If Davies hadn’t already been injured in Canadian colours – 16 months ago, in a tournament that didn’t matter – one wonders if he would have made a different decision. Were both men gun shy?
And if this was hockey, would we be talking about anything else? No chance. But it’s soccer, so yay, Canada! We probably won’t get ‘em next time.
Again, nothing wrong with that. But if ParticipACTION™ is enough for you, you’re never going to win much.