MEXICO CITY — September now looms large for Canada’s men’s national team after a 2-0 loss at the Azteca Stadium in Mexico City leaves it tied for second place in Group A in the CONCACAF region.
Andres Guardado converted a penalty in the 17th minute while Jesus Corona added one on the stroke of halftime and sealed their own team's passage to ‘The Hex’ in running Mexico's record to four wins from four games at this stage of qualifying.
The result has Canada tied for second but in third place behind Honduras after Honduras beat El Salvador 2-0 earlier in the evening The next qualifying game for Canada takes place at the Estadio Olimpico Metropolitano in San Pedro Sula, Honduras — a venue that holds so much woe for the Canadian men’s program.
“The Honduras match has a huge significance in the way Canadians look at us,” captain Julian de Guzman said, referring to the now infamous 8-1 defeat. “Our job is to change that around in general for Canadian soccer. Honduras is not as good as Mexico. It’s important that we were disciplined tonight. If we can do that in Honduras it will be a much different result.”
In contrast to the game in Vancouver where mistakes cost Canada in a 3-0 loss to this same Mexican side, Canada shook off some early jitters and was quite composed for large periods of time.
Doneil Henry committed the foul that led to the penalty but after that, he had some very strong moments with some good defensive stops and was rarely beaten.
At the end of the game, the Mexican supporters booed their team off the field as they expected a much better performance, so against a team that is superior, the Canadians could take some solace in the fact that they frustrated their hosts, especially in the second half.
After Henry committed the foul on Marco Fabian, Guardado went to his right with a shot that Milan Borjan nearly got to after guessing right. Borjan would later go down injured with a hand injury. As he left the stadium, Borjan said he thinks he suffered a broken bone.
In came Kenny Stamatopoulos and the goalkeeper couldn’t really do much when Corona scored from the top of the penalty area with a shot that went through traffic to Stamatopoulos’ right.
“Unfortunately I only saw it when it went past me,” Stamatopoulos said. “There were a lot of bodies in front of me and I heard it went through a couple of legs. But I didn’t really get to see too much.”
With Honduras winning 2-0 over El Salvador earlier in the day, Honduras sits at -1 on goal difference and Canada at -4. A loss in Honduras wouldn’t end Canada’s qualification hopes but would mean a large goal difference with Canada needing to beat El Salvador in the final game of the round and Canada needing a healthy win for Mexico over Honduras.
Canada has announced one game between now and then with a friendly against Azerbaijan in June.
