Despite the fervent support of a pro Salvadorian crowd and the excellent combination play from the Central Americans, The 0-0 draw between El Salvador and Canada is going to be remembered for a single moment. Cyle Larin’s glaring miss just 10 minutes before halftime.
The number one overall pick in this year’s MLS draft did the hard part. He smartly outwitted the offsides trap, calmly rounded the Salvadorian keeper, and then blasted the ball high and wide of the empty net.
“The ball bounced weird and I couldn’t get around it, that’s all that happened,” Larin said of his miss. “It doesn’t usually happen, but it happens once in your career and I guess this time it happened to me.”
El Salvador put six shots on goal versus Canada’s four, but they could not find an end product to their excellent buildup play which was chalk-full of exception technique purposeful combinations and attacking intent.
At the end of the day the bigger, faster and stronger Canadians were able to make the defensive plays when El Salvador had the ball in the most vital areas.
Despite seeing his side outmuscled, head coach Albert Roca was happy with the result. “Each time we had the ball we tried to strike,” the former La Liga player said. “We past the test that was placed against us in Canada.”
There was a worry that any hope of an El Salvador attack had gone out the window after Nelson Bonilla was the recipient of an inadvertent boot to the face from Adam Straith.
Bonilla went to the hospital for X-rays and observations, but Irvin Herrera came in and made sure the early offensive onslaught continued with three quick fire chances.
His efforts, however, ended with a weak snap header, a well hit shot straight at Kyriakos Stamatopoulos, and a sensational save by the Canadian keeper that was pushed away at full stretch when the ball looked destined for the far corner.
At the other end, Canada had an early free kick that was floated to the back post where Samuel Piette was left unmarked, but headed weakly at the keeper.
Following Larin’s miss, El Salvador almost pinched one right before halftime. A flurry of activity followed after a knifing run from the right wing and a cross by Richard Menjivar caused chaos in the box. After pin-balling around the area, a half-hearted clearance was floated back in and Stamatopoulos elected to punch when he could have caught the ball leading to one more opportunity in which the goalie was lucky to see a shot through a mass of bodies hit off his feet.
While El Salvador’s play was more inventive, the Canadians style was more direct and it begin to wear on what was essentially the home side.
Canada began to create the better of the chances. Just before the hour mark, Marcel del Jong took advantage of a turnover in midfield and raced down the wing before unleashing a hard shot from a tight angle that Derby Carrillo could only parry over his goal.
The resulting corner was cleared only as far as Straith right at the top of the box. The Norwegian based midfielder caught the volley well, but it dipped just on the wrong side of the crossbar.
Benito Floro went to his bench in the 69th minute and brought on Marcus Haber for a still clearly rattled Larin.
The 6’3’’ striker offered a different look as a traditional target player and he got free on two occasions but his headers were disappointing, weakly falling into the arms of Carrillo.
Canada fashioned two exceptional chances in the final 10 minutes.
In the 81st, Tosaint Ricketts almost picked out the far corner with a bicycle kick, but didn’t fully connect. Even so Carrillo still had to scramble across his goal.
Five minutes from time Russell Teibert tried his luck from distance, but saw his effort fall just over the crossbar, rippling the top of the net as it skimmed over. It would have been an incredible induction for the Vancouver Whitecaps midfielder who had entered the game just two minutes earlier.
The 0-0 draw means that Canada has failed to score from open play since the last group game in 2009.
At the same time, the Canucks have molded into a solid defensive unit under Benito Floro. Canada has five straight shutouts leaving the players very confident in their ability to hold onto three points once their Gold Cup offense gets back on track.
“I think it’s [tonight’s result] is a positive,” Canadian forward Tesho Akindele told reporters after the game. “We feel like if we get a win, we’re moving to the next round. We have two games. We definitely feel like we can do that.”
