CANADA WITHIN ONE WIN OF MAKING TOKYO OLYMPICS
Sinclair, Zadorsky shut down Mexico in CONCACAF women’s soccer qualifier
With a spot in the semifinal of the CONCACAF Women’s Olympic qualifying tournament already secured, the objective for Canada was to avoid the United States with Tokyo on the line.
Canada just needed a tie against Mexico in its final Group B game Tuesday in Edinburg, Texas, to secure top spot and avoid the
U.S. in the semifinal and accomplished that with a gritty 2-0 win.
Striker Christine Sinclair and defender Shelina Zadorsky scored for Canada, who will play Costa Rica in the semifinal Friday in Carson, Calif., for a berth into a fourth consecutive women’s Olympic tournament.
The two tournament finalists represent the region in the 12-team Tokyo Olympic tournament this summer. Canada is a two-time defending Olympic bronze medallist.
“It (qualifying for Olympics) means everything, that’s why we’re here,” Zadorsky told One Soccer following the win. “We came here to get nine points (three wins) in the group stage and now we want to go and we want to qualify and we want to win the tournament. We set the bar high for ourselves and we know the competition keeps getting harder and harder and we have to reflect and keep perfecting our performances.”
Canada went into the game with a 21-1-2 all-time record against Mexico. The only time Mexico had beaten Canada was at the qualifying tournament for the 2004 Olympics, where they pulled out a 2-1 victory in San Jose, Costa Rica.
Mexico were hoping to repeat the feat a little closer to home as Edinburg is located less than 35 kilometres from the border.
Spurred on by essentially a home crowd, Mexico got off to a good start, keeping Canada off-balance early. They created a couple of half chances as Canada tried to find their footing.
“We knew they were going to throw a little bit more at us and we were ready,” goalkeeper Stephanie Labbe said. “It doesn’t matter who steps in there, we had different people on the back line, different people in midfield and it doesn’t matter who’s in there this team is resilient and we pushed through that adversity. I’m so proud that we came out and really dominated this game and imposed our own Canadian DNA on it and coming away with the clean sheet (shutout) you always have to be happy.”
Eventually, Canada settled in and Sinclair opened the scoring in the 26th minute with her 186th international goal.
Sinclair finished off a ball cut across the Mexican penalty area by fullback Jayde Riviere. The 19-year-old Riviere from Markham, Ont., chased down a ball sent through by Janine Beckie and fired a low cross back across the penalty area, which landed on Sinclair’s foot. The leading international goal scorer of all time hammered a shot past Mexican goalkeeper Emily Alvarado to give Canada the lead.
Once up a goal, Canada dictated play in between some hard tackles by Mexico, earning them a pair of yellow cards. Canadian midfielder Jessie Fleming was cut down by Mexican defender Rebeca Bernal after playing a pass in midfield.
Earlier in the half, Mexican defender Jocelyn Orejel was booked for clipping the back of Sinclair’s heels to stop a counter attack. Beckie came close to increasing Canada’s lead when her shot from outside of the Mexican area hammered the crossbar. Beckie, 25, scored a hat trick in a 9-0 win against Jamaica on Saturday. Canada has not allowed a goal through its first three games of the tournament.
“I think we pride ourselves in being a tight team and having that Canadian DNA and just going hard and being really gritty and I think we’ve shown that so far,” Zadorsky said. “I know there will be a lot of dangerous forwards coming up in these next couple of games and we really got to keep it tight and really keep this momentum.”
Canada increased its lead before the end of the first half when Zadorsky scored her second international goal off a corner kick. The ball was lofted to the far post by Beckie and it dropped to Kadeisha Buchanan, who laid it off to Zadorsky at the top of the box. Zadorsky one-timed a left-footed shot that bounced through a maze of bodies and in past Alvarado.