Less than 12 hours later, Herdman faced a larger-than-usual group of Croatian media after training on Thursday to explain himself. The English tactician was quite apologetic, though perhaps not as much as the Croatians would have liked.
“I don’t mean any disrespect to the Croatian team and the Croatian people, but at the end of the day that’s the mindset that Canada is going to have if we want to have three points against one of the best teams in the world,” Herdman said. “And that’s the mindset we took to Belgium. We have to. This is part of the ‘New Canada.'”
It’s safe to say both sides will have solid material for Sunday’s bulletin board.
Herdman has proven himself to be an adaptable tactician over the past two years when he achieved the seemingly impossible to get Canada back to the World Cup, finishing atop the Concacaf qualifying table. But he made a name for himself as a motivator, and that’s certainly the effect he had on this group.
“We don’t mind it getting a little bit of media coverage,” Montreal defenseman Alistair Johnston said. “It’s a little fun, it gets a little more exciting around the game, not only in Canada and Croatia, but in other countries as well.
“You have a little bit of extra interest in the game, so I think that’s pretty exciting for us.”
Now the situation is “two birds with one stone”. Herdmann’s comments shifted the narrative from Alphonso Davies’ penalty miss and lack of clinical finishing against Belgium to ‘F Croatia’.
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