EAST RUTHERFORD, NJ — There’s always an air of excitement when a sporting event delivers a rare but authentic Cinderella story, and Canada’s underdog status against Argentina in the Copa America semi-final was ubiquitous no matter which lens you look at things from.
The trains to MetLife Stadium were packed with fans dressed in baby blue and white, singing songs on the way to the venue, while the dramatically outnumbered Canadian fans in bright red gave the thumbs up even as they politely minded their own business . The same was true in the stadium, where a tightly packed red section made up just a small portion of the 80,000 spectators in attendance.
It wasn’t long before the difference was felt on the pitch, reminding us that the question posed to Cinderella whether they could play one more match could simply be answered with ‘no’.
Canada lost 2-0 to Argentina on Tuesday after the energy evaporated just 20 minutes into the match, not helped by a hot summer day accompanied by oppressive humidity. That’s not to say Canada collapsed under the weight of expectations; the first Copa America semi-final simply became a slog meant to be survived, and so a sense of inevitability negated any excitement about an underdog story.
“I think the tournament caught up with us a little bit,” Canadian head coach Jesse Marsch said after the game. “Argentina rotated a lot of players during the tournament, so they used different players at different times, so they weren’t using the same players every match. There was heat, there was travel, there were a lot of challenges.”
It required each team to rely on its own parts rather than the sum, which would always benefit Argentina. It was far from their best 90-minute performance, but that didn’t matter as Lionel Messi finally scored his first goal of the competition as his team dominated the match. Adding to the sense of certain defeat was the loss of Canadian star and captain Alphonso Davies, who Marsch said will need an X-ray after leaving the game with an injury.
And yet the air of optimism lingered. How could that be, considering Marsch has been on the job for less than two weeks and has taken Canada all the way to the semi-finals of a competition they were struggling to qualify for before he showed up?
It’s an impressive feat with so little preparation time and with a player pool that has some star power but is incomparable to the top-ranked team in the world. Luck always plays a role; Arguably on the easy side of the standings, Canada faced a number of lower-ranked sides from South America heading into the semi-finals, allowing them to get away with just two goals so far. One-off tournament meetings are also the perfect setting for a team to punch above their weight, as long as they have a good day. Marsch himself admitted that his first few weeks on the job have gone better than expected, with them now completing their first-ever trip to the Copa America in Saturday’s third-place match.
“It will be difficult when we are all ready to say goodbye because I really enjoyed the process with this team and I think we have made a lot of progress together,” he said. “We had an amazing five weeks together, six weeks together, and it went way better than any of us could have scripted. We still have a lot of work to do, but we have laid a very good foundation and I am very optimistic about what the future can look like.”
But in just a few short weeks, Marsch has mapped out the mission for the sport’s mediocre national teams, all of whom have the ambition to do better than some might expect, regardless of the challenges they face. He translated his attacking, penetrating style to international level with immediate results, helping Canada score almost seven expected goals and create danger along the way, even if, as Marsch himself admits, they needed to be more efficient in front of goal. It’s a demonstration that strong coaching can boost any team’s chances, an exciting prospect amid the visionless scenarios other similarly ranked national teams find themselves in.
The easiest comparisons to Canada’s meteoric success are the neighboring US and Mexico, both of whom will co-host the 2026 World Cup with Canada and enter the Copa America as a chance to make an impression before the tournament on home soil in two years . The other two have historically been better than Canada, but still crashed out of the group stage and now feel directionless for various reasons. The situation in the US is especially dire because Marsch was a candidate for the job in his native country but said he was “not treated very well during the process” that led to them rehiring Gregg Berhalter a year ago.
However, these two teams are far from the only examples, as so many national teams find themselves in the middle of their own plateaus for various reasons, chief among them the fact that it is simply remarkably difficult to turn a roach into a dark horse. . While Marsch and company deserve praise from their country, they have also set the bar much higher than initially expected – and perhaps raised the stakes in the process. If the Copa America was a dress rehearsal for the World Cup, the countdown to deliver on the bill in two years has officially begun.
Marsch has already identified the areas for improvement for the next two years.
“Creating a broader player pool will be important,” he said. “And then we continue to work on the details of how we’re going to play, but we’re off to a really good start.”
The first point harkens back to Argentina’s strengths since the team found a way to go the entire tournament without Messi and managed to rotate as they toured the US to defend their Copa America title. It may also be the hardest thing for Marsch to do, as he has only so much control over player development. It’s as big a promise as any, though, and it’s incumbent on him and the Canadian Soccer Association to deliver on it within the next two years.
Given Marsch’s limitations, it could be an uphill battle. In addition to the still limited player pool, international coaches will have occasional FIFA-approved breaks to impose their playing style and Canada will have the added difficulty of planning high-quality friendlies while the rest of the world is busy with World Cup matches qualifying matches. . Time will tell if this is an impossible task or the beginning of the blueprint for national teams hoping that the sum is greater than the parts.