If you ever spend time hang out around hardcore fans of the Canadian national teams or just scrolling around the Voyageurs forum you may know of a group of people who would love to see the east coast get more games. That is in part due to a desire to put games in a location where the chances of having a large number of fans supporting to opposition are diminished and in part due to the fact that it seems like every time the east coast gets a one off type sporting event they make it count.
Now on May 30 they will get their chance to see if they are right about the east coast. That is the date which the CSA has announced for a friendly between the Canadian Womens National team and their Chinese counterparts. The game is set to take place at Stade Moncton in, you guessed it Moncton!
The match follows on the heals of Canada finishing second in the Cyprus Cup after a 2-0 defeat to France in the finals and along with the recently announced friendlies against Sweden and Brazil will be a key part of the teams Olympic preparations. The squad will be playing games as well as having a residency camp in Vancouver in hopes of being completely prepared when London 2012 rolls around.
At the start of the year the CSA as well as John Herdman stated their desire to having the womens team play more games on Canadian soil after the success of Olympic Qualifying in Vancouver. With the other two friendlies set to take place in Sweden and the US this match against China is their first step towards achieving that.
In other, more Toronto FC relevant, Canada news the CSA also announced recently that the U23 squad will face Trinidad and Tobago in mid-March as their only preparatory friendly before they begin Olympic Qualifying. This team seems to be sort of forgotten as they will not even announce the roster for camp until sometime in the coming days while the United States has already held two different camps. At this stage it looks like Canada's men are going to need a small miracle to make it to the Olympics after such a lack of preparation in the build up to a difficult tournament. We will certainly keep an eye out for that roster as a number of Toronto FC's younger players will be in the mix.