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Canada trying to unlock Panama's defence
Canada escaped with a win despite being unable to convert several clear chances on goal, in a tight, defensive contest with Panama. Stephen Hart lined up Canada in a 4-3-3 with Julian De Guzman as the anchor man/defensive midfielder in front of the four-man back line consisting of David Edgar, Andre Hainault, Kevin McKenna, and Ante Jazic. De Guzman was assisted by Will Johnson in the build up, while Simeon Jackson and Atiba Hutchinson were the midfielders with the task of supporting Olivier Occean up top.
See also: De Jong to Milan and the role of the holding midfielder
Dwayne De Rosario basically stayed wide open on the left flank providing width. But he wasn’t involved on the build up and his lack of movement put him out of the game in the first part so the attacks were primarily coming just from the right flank or from the middle. Maybe it would have been a different situation had Hart lined up De Rosario centrally as attacking midfielder, in the zone between Panama’s centre-backs and holding midfielders, pushing Hutchinson into a left wing position.
One of the first attacking options for Canada was to reach Olivier Occean with long and direct balls in the way to exploit the physical’s abilities of the Eintracht Frankfurt’s forward. In that way Canada can get the ball above the midfield and tried to play the ball on the ground on the other half of field. As the game progressed, with Panama retreating back to stay deeper, Canada tried to move the ball on the flanks to send nice balls into the box from the outsides. However, in general, they showed a lack of attacking variety.
With Panama sitting deep, Canada found difficulties to reach the goal and create scoring chances, despite attacking with many players, including overlapping left back Jazic. So Canada was the dominant side in terms of ball possession, but failed to build scoring opportunities. While Canada’s back four had no problem dealing with the rare Panama’s attacks, shots were rare in this match and the only chances for Hart’s side came from set pieces, where Canadiens took advantage of their superior athletic skills and of Kevin McKenna headers. With the ball on the ground, Hutchinson was the most dangerous attacking threat for Canada. He was so effective here moving high up between the lines.
On the defensive end, Canada was able to close the spaces as all the players were ready to step back helping the defensive line and packing the midfield with 5 men. They didn’t press hard but being able to come back quickly, as I said earlier, avoided the risk to expose the back line to Panama’s counter-attacks.
The second half started in the same way the first one with Canada slow on building up from the back and unable to create scoring opportunities. De Rosario rose up a bit starting to move himself around from a left wing to a central position during the attacks, trying to find nice balls and to get more involved on the attacking phase.
Sending on Tosaint Ricketts to Occean changed nothing as Valeranga’s man played a similar role, as offensive pivot waiting for the upcoming midfielders. With the game near to the end and with Panama so compact, the only way to find the net would have been a single play made by one player.
The right moment happened when Hutchinson, on a free kick situation following a play on the right side, found De Rosario unmarked into the box for the decisive 1-0. At the end, it was a boring match in terms of offense between two sides that approached the game in two different ways, with Panama playing defensive and Canada trying, but failing, to build scoring opportunities successfully. The Canadian team deserved to win being the better side, but there is still plenty of room to improve from this display against an underperforming opponent who will undoubtedly be better at home Tuesday night.
Michele Tossani is a football tactician with a Ph.D. in History. Michele resides in Florence, Italy and is a tactical analyst for Futbol-Tactico.com
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