

Posted by

Steve Bottjer ,

August 24, 2014 Email

Steve Bottjer

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@BottjerRNO

With the Canadian Men’s National Team scheduled to play their first home fixture of the Benito Floro era on September 9th in Toronto, there has been plenty of speculation as to the makeup of the roster that will face off against Jamaica at BMO Field.



While some have speculated that the location and the timing of the match will necessitate a squad that will draw heavily from Major League Soccer clubs, it appears that won’t necessarily be the case.



According to Head Coach Floro, Canadian national team supporters can expect to see a first choice squad consisting of Canada’s top players lining up against the Jamaicans.



“We have finished the first stage (of the process we put in place last year),” the Spanish Head Coach told RedNation. “For the next stage we need to define the eighteen most important players. From now until the next World Cup we will call up all of the players that we require who are in good fitness because we need to put the best team out there to win the games and to play well.”



“It does not matter where they are playing or their age,” Floro added. “Call-ups will be based on their capacity to play well and deliver a result for us.”



It’s been just over a year since the very experienced Floro took over at the helm of the Men’s Canadian National Team program and much of his first twelve months on the job has been characterized by a process in which he has called up and evaluated a large number of players, including a high percentage of young players. The Spaniard has also often held two types of training camps – matches and sessions in Europe for Canadian players who play their club football in Europe and matches and camps in the United States for his North America-based players.



It now appears that both of those routines will be a thing of the past, as Floro is now moving from a stage of evaluation and education to one in which the onus will be on tangible results.



“The Jamaica game is a very important game for us for two reasons,” Floro said. “First, we now need to field the best team every time we play. Secondly, our CONCACAF ranking is not very good, so we need to win the match while at the same time playing well.”



“Both the result and how we play is very important for us, but the most important thing at this moment is that we have defined 18 important players,” Floro added. “We need to consider the game against Jamaica as an official game and not as a friendly. The mentality of the players must change because it is a very important game for us. Jamaica is a good team, so they will be a good test for us and for me in particular, because I need test how the players perform in our stadium versus another pitch outside of Canada. I also need to test how the players play in a game under pressure and in front of our supporters.”



Floro’s change in approach seemed to be reinforced when he was asked about the possibility of calling up two players – Maxim Tissot, a Montreal Impact Academy graduate who has impressed at the Major League Soccer level in recent week, and Dejan Jakovic, a veteran Canadian International who has been excelling while playing his club soccer on the other side of the planet in Japan.



(Tissot) is at a similar level to a lot of other Canadian players,” Floro explained. “At this moment, we need to choose the right 18-20 players to get results. It means that for these upcoming camps we can choose 1-2 new players to test but we cannot choose 10 players because we would lose the ability to have our most important players come together to make a powerful team.”



“Dejan is an important player for us,” Floro said. “(Canadian National Team Asssistant Coach) Antonio (Floro) is in weekly contact with him via email. He will be here in September. Dejan is playing in a very good league and he is a good player for us.”



While Floro’s selection process going forward will now be quite different compared to previous matches and training camps, it appears that one thing that won’t change is the priority that the Spaniard places on utilizing the most experienced players in Canada’s player pool for both their individual qualities as players and for their abilities as leaders on the pitch and training ground.



With that in mind, Floro was quick to reinforce that Canada’s all-time leading goal scorer Dwayne De Rosario is still very much an important part of the Canadian National Team even given the fact that the 36 year old has not been seeing very many minutes with Toronto FC this season.



“De Rosario is a special player because he is a very good player with a lot of experience,” Floro stated. “His spirit is very good and tactically he is very intelligent and physically he is not bad. It is true that the fact that he is not starting (with Toronto) is a little bit of a problem. I think De Rosario can still help us until he decides that he doesn’t want to play anymore.”



Floro is expected to officially announce his roster for Canada’s next match against Jamaica on Thursday.



