Team Overview
By Scott French | @ScottJFrench |
The golden generation of Panamanian players who followed in the Dely Valdes brothers' footsteps has played into its 30s, something that’s become a concern. There's certainly talent -- it's bewildering that Panama has been unable to match Costa Rica's or Honduras' strides -- but development has lagged.
The best of the current generation has been good, especially in midfield with San Jose Earthquakes Anibal Godoy and Alberto Quintero, home-based Armando Cooper, and rising regular Valentin Pimentel, but there's just hasn’t been enough quality players.
Jaime Penedo, ex of the LA Galaxy, is one of the region's top goalkeepers, and 35-year-old Mexico-based defender Felipe Baloy, Vancouver Whitecaps forward Blas Perez (also 35), and former Real Salt Lake forward Luis Tejada (34) are genuine stars.
Panama sandwiched solid CONCACAF Gold Cup showings in 2013 (runner-up) and 2015 (third place) around a brutally disappointing 2014 World Cup qualifying campaign, one in which it was 90 seconds from Brazil before conceding two stoppage-time goals in the finale at home against the U.S. The team is capable of surprising, but Group D, with Argentina and Chile, might be a mountain too tall.
Key player
Jaime Penedo - Panama is going to be on its heels much of the tournament, especially in the Group D fights with the Argentines and Chileans. The team will need the former Galaxy netminder at his best if it’s going to have even the smallest chance of getting to the final eight.
Penedo's an instinctual goalkeeper that Bruce Arena targeted after his enormous performance in Panama's Gold Cup title-game run three years ago, and his work with Ian Feuer and then Matt Reis has broadened his palette, especially on shot-stopping. His work in Los Angeles narrowed his tendency to give up soft goals.
He did well with LA -- he's third all-time among MLS goalkeepers for goals-against average (1.09) -- but departed in discord after last summer's Gold Cup and signed a multi-year deal with Saprissa. After just half a year, he announced he was leaving the Costa Rican power.
Penedo has a veteran backline in front of him, but Panama's penchant for giving away leads has to be conquered.
Manager spotlight
Hernan Dario Gomez's expertise will be of great aid to Los Canaleros. The colorful Colombian is a veteran of big tournaments -- he's coached in four World Cups and several Copa Americas -- and won CONCACAF's coach-of-the-year honor in January after leading Panama, the fourth nation he's guided, to third in last year's Gold Cup.
Gomez said in February he'd turned down an offer to become Chile's coach because he wanted to guide Panama to its first World Cup appearance, quite a turnaround after threatening to quit following the “utter robbery” that cost Los Canaleros in the 2015 Gold Cup semifinal loss to Mexico.
A former midfielder with his hometown archrivals Independiente Medellin and Atletico Nacional, Gomez, 60, joined Francisco Maturana's staff in the late '80s with Nacional before moving with him to Colombia, where the team reached the World Cup quarterfinals in 1990 but bowed out in the first round four years later. He succeeded Maturana with the national team, prodding them back to the World Cup in 1998, then took Ecuador to its first World Cup appearance four years later.
He followed with another with Colombia -- he was forced to resign after slugging a woman outside a bar -- and coached a couple of clubs at home before accepting the Panama job.
Success looks like...
Panama faces few expectations -- Argentina or Chile could win the whole thing -- and will need something of a miracle to reach the quarterfinals. Anything more, there'll be parades in Panama City.
A victory over Bolivia in its June 6 opener in Orlando is critical, and the team will need to be sharp on the counter if it’s going to have a shot at points in the games against the powerhouses that follow. Luis Tejada has 41 international goals and Blas Perez has 38, so they can finish if the opportunity is there, but Panama's midfield will have to win some battles if that's going to happen.
And the team has to be organized at the back, not give away easy chances, and it will have come up big under heavy pressure. That's not been part of their DNA, so good luck.
Failure looks like...
Panama could go 0-3-0 and look upon this as a positive experience. The chief aim is to maneuver through CONCACAF qualifying and get to Russia in another couple of years -- the nation’s never appeared in a World Cup -- and the Centenario competition is something on which it can draw when those matches turn tough. Play well, mostly, throw a genuine challenge at the opposition, and see what sticks - that'll work.
What won't is an embarrassment: Get outclassed by Bolivia and buried by Argentina and Chile. The response at home would not be good.
