The Canadian Soccer men's national team has surprised many across the continent since American Jesse Marsch took over coaching duties with the team almost a year ago.
The depth and quality of the football displayed by the team were reflected in the last two official tournaments played, and the team’s record-high position in the FIFA ranking reflects that. The team is now 30th after climbing one spot.
So far, Canada’s record under Marsch is 6-4-5, including a fourth-place finish in the CONMEBOL Copa America 2024 and the recent bronze medal at the Concacaf Nations League Finals 2025.
However, these results do not completely reflect Canada’s performance on the pitch, with many of the games seeing an aggressive, fast and solid team who deserved to get wins.
Most aspects of the current process are positive and show a significant improvement, including that fourth-place finish in their inaugural appearance at the Copa America, a tie against France and consecutive wins against the U.S.
While Les Rouges’ performance on the pitch has been outstanding in many of their games, the team faces two main issues evidenced throughout Marsch’s leadership so far.
The main issue the team is the lack of effectiveness in front of goal, evidenced through multiple games such as against Venezuela in the quarterfinals of the Copa America, against Suriname in the quarterfinals of the Concacaf Nations League and against Mexico in the semifinals of the same competition.
Against La Vinotinto in the Copa America’s quarterfinals, Canada outperformed the Venezuelans in every aspect of the game, something that the team was unable to reflect in the score. It needed a penalty shootout to give Canada the pass into the semifinal.
In the first leg of the Nations League quarterfinals played at Paramaribo, Suriname, the Canucks showed their superiority in every aspect of the game against The Natio.
Just as in the Copa America, the score didn’t show the actual superiority of the Canadian team that got the away victory near the last minute, the final score didn’t tell the actual story of the match.
El Tri was the rival for the semifinal of the Nations League, a match that couldn’t have started worse for Canada after Mexico’s striker Raul Jimenez scored before the first minute of the game.
Canada tried to create danger by Mexico's net who were defending near their goalkeeper and playing on counterattack. Mexico got the 2-0 win with Canada being unable to break Mexico's defence and wasting their chances.
These matches show a consistency in Canada's intention of having an offensive game which they've achieved, but it also revealed a lack of capitalizing scoring opportunities, no matter what the final score ends up being.
According to Footy Stats, the team averages 1.3 goals per game, but that number could be higher if Canada improves their shot quality.
Along with Canada’s impressive displays of football, another aspect Canada’s rivals took advantage of was the team’s naivety in some instances of the games, especially when running with the advantage in the score.
This was also visible in the quarterfinals against Venezuela, just before Venezuela’s striker Salomon Rondon tied the game in a counterattack.
The goal came from a throw-in by Canada, who went into the offensive, just leaving a defender to face Venezuela’s counterattacks, along with the goalkeeper well ahead of the penalty box.
This defensive strategy left Canada extremely vulnerable defensively, which ended up giving Venezuela the tie.
Uruguay was the next rival to take advantage of the Canadian defensive strategy in the match for the bronze medal of the Copa America.
With the team leading by 2-1, instead of closing spaces to try to counterattack to hold on the lead, Canada kept playing as if the game was still tied which found Canada’s defence disorganized. Uruguay scored a second goal that tied the game, which then gave the bronze medal to La Celeste in a penalty shootout.
However, for the bronze medal match against the U.S., Canada didn’t repeat the same thing after leading the game by the same score.
The team retreated and defended the result near the net defended by Canada’s goalkeeper Dayne St. Clair instead of going into the attack as they did with Uruguay.
The Canucks got the win and with it the bronze medal of the Nations League Finals 2025.
Canada has shown they’ve learned from their mistakes, and with the Concacaf Gold Cup set to start June 14, the team will look for their first title since 2000 when they lifted the Gold Cup trophy against Colombia.
A possible solution may be modifying certain players' initial positions, such as Jonathan David, who plays as a second striker instead of centre forward, as he usually does in Lille.
The team will play friendly matches as preparation against Ukraine and Côte d'Ivoire on June 7 and 10, respectively.
Marsch and his players will have a good test to show their improvements to finally lift the trophy on July 7.
