TEAM CANADA’S MOMENT
After all the preparation, the Women’s World Cup begins today in Edmonton
The moment has arrived for Team Canada, the players having prepared meticulously to master the occasion, not let it defeat them.
For head coach John Herdman and his 23-member national women’s soccer team, the stage could not be bigger: a once-ina-lifetime World Cup of Soccer on home turf. The opener goes Saturday in front 50,000-plus fans at Commonwealth Stadium and a worldwide TV audience potentially in the hundreds of millions.
Through three years of preparation, including eight months when most of the team was centralized in Vancouver, the coach and his players have consistently made a convincing case that they have trained — physically, strategically, emotionally — for every situation.
But even Herdman, a comprehensively thorough man, blinked a bit when he sat down alongside veteran goalkeeper Erin McLeod in front of about 100 media members for a 20-minute news conference Friday afternoon.
“Could we fit any more press in?” Herdman said. “This is unbelievable.
“For women’s sport, this will be a first in Canada. I was saying to Erin, this is the first time we’re feeling a bit of nerves.”
In the murky past, Canadian athletes and teams sometimes let grand occasions wrestle them to the ground. At the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Canada famously did not win a gold med- al. Among able-bodied athletes, Canada didn’t win any medals at the 2001 World Championships in Athletics, the last international event of similar magnitude held at Commonwealth Stadium.
But this team is standing on the shoulders of more-recent athletic achievements: Canada’s record 14 gold medals at the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver and the soccer team’s own dramatic and surprising bronze medal at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.
Men’s Olympic team hockey coach Mike Babcock famously spoke to the soccer women about the sorts of details — how to ration time with family and friends — that sometimes are overlooked.
“It’s not bravado here, there’s a genuine belief in this team that there’s a confidence there,” Herdman said. “Are we the favourites for the event? No. Can we get on a roll in this tournament with our country behind us? Yes.
“This group of women believe they can go all the way and they’ve got a greater purpose ... than any other team at this event, a much greater purpose. And when you’ve got that, it gives you a chance of going places you never thought you could get to.”
To McLeod, who plays like a force of nature in goal, the attention surrounding this World Cup is historic. “Even at the grassroots level, soccer is changing in this country. It’s becoming a permanent culture and I’m proud of that,” McLeod said.
Something else. McLeod knows all about a team getting on a roll at home. She backstopped Canada to the final of the 2002 Under-19 Women’s World Cup in Edmonton, the crowds growing along the way until just shy of 48,000 fans rocked Commonwealth Stadium.
At that event, Canada surfed on the unexpected excitement and attention; this time they want to use it as a tool, as part of their competitive advantage.
“Blessing or burden, right?” said Carmelina Moscato, who also played on the 2002 team. “That pressure, that’s exactly what it is.
“They have prepared us for those moments. We watched the Brazilian (men’s) team in 2014 (at the World Cup) ... saw them, arm-in-arm ... while the whole, entire stadium, I think it was 80,000 fans, were screaming their guts out (singing the national anthem).
“It was such an emotional anthem that they (the team) were drained.”
That was before the semifinal game when Germany hammered the emotionally poleaxed Brazil side 7-1.
“We’ve talked about those instances where, you know, ‘are you on task?’ Can you manage the amount of energy and emotion coming your way?” Moscato said.
The Canadians believe they are ready for this. They think the run-up to the event has prepared the public to provide useful energy to the home side.
“With regard to the crowd, I just believe you can’t let a home World Cup pass without really priming your audience and understanding that, you know, this is the team,” Moscato said. “We wanted to show our personalities, we want people to come and support all the good work that we’ve done and show that they’re (the opposition) playing on our turf and we want to protect that.”
How does McLeod think she’ll react when 50,000-plus are singing O Canada this afternoon?
“I’m a pretty emotional person, so hopefully I won’t be bawling,” McLeod said, deadpan. “No, realistically, we’ve gone over every scenario and (including) playing in front of that many people, obviously playing at home, in general with (people like) my Gram, the 94-year-old one who greeted me at the airport.
“There are going to be some people who have shaped my life in the crowd. But I have a job to do first and I’m going to make sure that I stay on task.
“I can deal with the emotions after the game.”