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CINCINNATI Before youre tempted to ordain the Los Angeles Dodgers as World Series champions for the first time in 29 years, a little history lesson might be in order.

First, only one player who has any sort of prominent role with the Dodgers, Chase Utley, even has been in a World Series. Second, and probably more importantly, only six of the 22 National League teams who have finished with the leagues best record since the three-tiered playoffs began in 1995 have made it to the World Series. And only two of them have won, with one being the Chicago Cubs last year. The other club was the 1995 Atlanta Braves, who won the World Series the first year there were three rounds of playoffs and then never again.

Four other clubs, including the Cardinals 100-win teams in 2004 and 2013, made it to the World Series but didnt win.

Third, how will lefthanded ace Clayton Kershaws back behave the rest of the year? Last year, after returning from back problems that cost him more than two months, Kershaw was relatively strong in the last month of the regular season. But in 24 1/3 postseason innings, including the time he was called upon to save the final game of the division series, he allowed 12 runs and had nothing left in Game 6 of the league championship , when he and the Dodgers were shut out 5-0 in Chicago as the Cubs punched their World Series ticket.

But what the Dodgers have done so far, is amazing, said Whitey Herzog, who steered his Kansas City Royals to a lengthy, similar rush 40 years ago.

Their pitching has been awfully steady, said Herzog. Their bullpen has been outstanding. And that kid (Cody Bellinger) is hitting all those home runs. Theyve won so many games late in the game. Really amazing.

This year, the Dodgers were 10-12 before going 66-20 in their next 84 games. At a later point in the 1977 season, Herzogs Royals were 28-31 and then went 63-23, including winning 16 in a row starting on Aug. 31 of that year. They lost one, then won eight more in succession, running that hot streak to 24 victories in 25 games. They would finish 74-29 after June 16, which was roughly what the Dodgers record was before the weekend.

Herzog, noting how the Dodgers managed to win the division last year when Kershaw was out for so long, gave credit to manager Dave Roberts, who was in his first year then. He did one helluva job, said Herzog. He seems enthusiastic. Of course, its easy to be enthusiastic every day when you win. Its when youre losing every day that it seems to lag.

The Dodgers have an outside shot at 116 wins, the major league record for a season held by the 1906 Chicago Cubs in a 154-game season and the Seattle Mariners in 2001 in a 162-game season. It is worth noting that neither of those clubs won the World Series either.

Theyve got to keep playing like hell to do that, said Herzog. Is it sustainable? I guess its sustainable. They wont get rained out. But without Kershaw (who is out several more weeks), it doesnt seem possible to do that.

Herzog can remember the 1977 season as if it was yesterday. On the night the Royals stretched their winning streak to 16, they beat Oakland twice in extra innings in a twi-night doubleheader that was delayed by rain in Kansas City and didnt end until nearly 3:30 a.m.

There were torrential rains in the area and seven people drowned that night, recalled Herzog. There almost was an eighth as Herzogs son, David, had his car sucked into an open manhole but made it out alive.

The next night, Herzog said his team, understandably, was tired and lost to Seattles Doc Medich before putting together the eight-game winning streak.

Gene Mauch, who was managing Minnesota then, said that no team in the division was good enough to pull away, Herzog said. We won 16 in a row and Texas won 13 games out of 17 and lost 3 games in the standings.

It amazing how things happened how it just seemed everything worked out for us, said Herzog. We didnt have a great bullpen, but we had a lot of guys who pitched in and did their job.

But there was disappointment at the end, when the Royals lost the American League championship series to the New York Yankees three games to two, dropping the last two games at home.

And Billy Martin benched Reggie Jackson for the fifth game, said Herzog. Then he goes on to become Mr. October the next week. Figure that one out.

The Royals scored twice in the first inning of the last game and were nursing a 3-1 lead into the eighth but allowed one run in the eighth and three in the ninth as the Yankees won 5-3, delaying Kansas Citys first World Series appearance for three more years.

Thats one game Ill never forget, said Herzog.

In Game 4 of that series, Herzog yanked first baseman John Mayberry, who seemed ill, after he dropped a pop foul. He didnt play Mayberry, who had 23 homers that year, in Game 5, as he suspected that Mayberry may have been under the influence of something the day before.

Herzog said baseball can use the publicity generated by the Dodgers long stretch of torrid baseball and the chance they could approach the record for wins if they could keep it up. Otherwise, there are very few divisional pennant races and he said he was tired of hearing about the knockout game, meaning the one-game playoff in each league to open the postseason.

Three of the six division pacesetters the Dodgers, Washington and Houston have leads of more than 10 games, which, if taken to the end of the season, would mark the first time that has happened since 2002 when Atlanta, the Cardinals, Boston and Minnesota all won their divisions by 10 games or more.

That was the year that both wild-card teams, San Francisco and Anaheim, qualified for the World Series with the Angels winning. Since then, there have been four other wild-card teams to win the World Series Florida (2003), Boston (2004), the 2011 Cardinals and San Francisco (2014).

They raise hell about the wild-card winning too many times, said Herzog. If theyre going to continue to have five-game series in the division round they should play seven games with no days off they should reward the team which has the best record and plays the knockout winner. The way it stands now, the knockout winner is even (in home games) after four games. Give the wild-card winner the third game at home and the other four games you play at the team with the best record. That way, the knockout winner would have to win at least twice on the field of the team with the best record, plus its own home game.

Still an avid watcher of baseball as he nears age 86, Herzog said he cringes when he sees players swinging from their butt. He laments long games and said he had a discussion about this with commissioner Rob Manfred last week at the Hall of Fame ceremonies in Cooperstown, N.Y.

It used to be that you would see about 265 pitches for a nine-inning game, Herzog said. Every morning when I get up, I dont check to see who got the winning hit. I check the number of pitches. Right now, there are about 285 pitches in a game and how many games do you see 320 or 360 pitches in nine innings?

Now, how are you going to do this? Are you going to play seven-inning games? Or are you are going to play with two strikes and three balls? Thats messing with the rules and youd better not do that. But weve got too many throwers and not enough pitchers.

Young pitchers ... all they care about is what the radar gun says. Why dont you take them out of the stadiums and take them out of the broadcast booths? Let the scouts be the only ones who have them. That might help them become pitchers.

Too many counts go to 3-2, Herzog said, because of nit-picking, instead of the outcome of an at-bat being settled at 0-2.

You can do something about this in the minor leagues, he said. Let them throw 125 pitches but tell all your young kids not to waste pitches out of the strike zone. Then they can accomplish that before they even get to the big leagues.

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Hummel: Can the Dodgers go all the way? - STLtoday.com

Stephen Miller stood in front of a gaggle of reporters this week and declared that Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free was an embarrassing footnote in American history.

He was talking about the White Houses push on the RAISE Act, a bill that would cut legal immigration to the US in half over the next decade (mostly by slashing family-based immigration and ending the countrys diversity visa" lottery). This was part of an effort by the White House, as John Cornyn said, to reopen a national conversation about legal immigration specifically, to introduce the possibility that it might in fact be bad in current quantities.

The White House also recently held a press conference to talk about how Central American immigrants are feeding into the gang MS-13: that they rape and murder people instead of assimilating, that they are criminals who have taken over Americas streets.

These arent just messages being sent from the White House, a "Too Much Immigration Is Bad" week along the lines of "Infrastructure Week" and "American Heroes Week." Theyre messages sent throughout the Trump administration and sometimes, the tiniest changes are the most revealing ones.

A couple of weeks ago, the Trump administration quietly changed the name of a grant given by US Citizenship and Immigration Services to local organizations from Citizenship and Integration to Citizenship and Assimilation.

The small tweak was a shot across the bow. Its a declaration of who should be considered fully American: not just putting down roots in a community, becoming integrated into its economy and civic life, but assimilating sloughing off something of ones ancestral culture to take on something American instead.

The Trump administration is reopening a conversation much bigger than "how many immigrants should the US admit." Its reintroducing the idea that diversity itself might not be a good thing for America. In Trumps America, diversity has rendered swaths of the country unrecognizable and even hostile to longtime Americans largely the white voters who make up Trumps base. Not only do they want to take their country back, but they are anxious never to "lose" it again.

For the past several decades, diversity has been something that both sides of the political aisle at least paid lip service to.

Not everyone saw diversity as something worth pursuing for its own sake, to be sure hence constant debates over affirmative action versus meritocracy.

But the idea of diversity, in and of itself, wasnt a wedge issue. It was a value that everyone claimed to uphold, and some simply doubted the strength of others commitment to it.

Those who believed that diversity was a threat to the American way of life an intrusion of foreign cultures, strange religions, and alien ideas didnt find any quarter for that belief in polite company, mass media, or politics. Now, they have their champion. The idea of diversity itself is now back up for debate.

There was an obvious upside, for Republicans, in defanging diversity turning it into a trope of apolitical, apple-pie Americana. Their base continued to be wary, at best, that newcomers to America strengthened the country. But their base was aging, and the younger generations of Americans, increasingly, took strength in diversity as a fact of life.

Crucially, those younger generations were, themselves, more ethnically diverse than their elders. The factoid that America will become a majority-minority nation by 2050 was more likely to be used as a talking point in political consultants presentations about building coalitions than voiced as an anxiety by mainstream politicians. America was coming to diversity just as inevitably as diversity was coming to America, and worrying about it made you seem like not only a racist but a fool.

Back when diversity was a settled question at least in public it was assumed that any politician (or company, or celebrity) would want people of different races, religions, and abilities highly placed at public events and featured in promotional campaigns. It was assumed that the president would do anodyne photo-ops like hosting a Ramadan break-fast things that would both remind Muslims in the US that America agreed they were Americans, and remind non-Muslims that someone can be American while observing religious holidays and eating traditional foods. There was an interest in treating everyone as, if not yet fully American, Americanizable and an awareness that maybe it would be America that would change to meet them, as much as the other way around.

There was an interest in portraying, and treating, no one as unassimilable. Trump has given those who worried immigrants might not integrate a voice a powerful one.

The distinction between assimilation and integration between the vision of America as a melting pot and America as a salad, to use the standard metaphors might seem like nothing more than a difference of degree: how much someone should have to change to become American once arriving here.

But its really a question of how diverse a country can be without breaking.

Whats really striking about the RAISE Act introduced in the Senate this week by Sens. Tom Cotton (R-AR) and David Purdue (R-GA) and endorsed by the White House is that its authors characterize it as a shift away from family-based immigration and toward merit-based immigration. But the bill doesnt actually shift slots allocated for the former toward the latter; it simply slashes family-based immigration, while leaving merit-based immigration flat, so that merit-based immigration becomes more common than family-based immigration by default.

By doing this, the bill wouldnt just be an unprecedented cut to legal immigration. It would make the very merit-based immigrants it claims to welcome less likely to want to stay because highly skilled immigrants often want to live with their families, too.

In theory, if America took integration as the goal of its immigration policy, it would encourage people to put down roots rather than coming to the US for a few years and leaving, or staying here without fully committing to citizenship. It would encourage their spouses to work, their children to attend US schools and learn English (and perhaps be cared for by members of the extended family when both parents are at work), their wages to stay in the American economy rather than being sent home in remittances.

But the worry at the core of chain migration is that at a certain mathematical tipping point, having an excess family member come renders the whole family less American (even if each family member has had to live in the US for a decade or longer before sending for anyone else).

If you believe that Americanness is brittle, you want to be damned sure the people youre bringing to America wont break it before you make too many commitments to let them stay.

The thing about assimilation, you see, is that the people most anxious about it tend to believe that there are some people who simply arent assimilable whether because theyre not evolved enough (per early-20th-century eugenicists), or because their cultures and worldviews are simply irreconcilable with American views of freedom and achievement (per early-21st-century anti-Sharia activists).

This is the power of the old complaint that when my ancestors came to this country they learned English and worked hard, nowadays immigrants just dont bother. Its false on both counts. But it also lends itself well to the assumption that these supposed individual moral failings can be prevented by changing the way America selects immigrants as a whole that you can predict which kinds of immigrants will and will not be willing to give up who they have been to become Americans.

This is a theme Trump has hit on anew lately. In his speech Friday on Long Island, he used it to characterize MS-13 gang violence as a failure of assimilation:

You say what happened to the old days where people came into this country, they worked and they worked and they worked and they had families and they paid taxes and they did all sorts of things, and their families got stronger and they were closely knit. We don't see that. Failure to enforce our immigration laws had predictable results. Drugs, gangs, and violence.

Trumps rhetoric is powerful because it ties a specific problem of gang violence to a whole wave of migrants from Central America deeming them all, to some extent, unassimilable.

Theres no indication that its true, any more than that it was true that the Mexican migrants of the last couple of decades were unassimilable, any more than its true that Muslim Americans are unassimilable.

For his audience, though, its very easy to take the high-profile incidents of aberrant behavior especially when that behavior is an act of gruesome violence and blow it up into a shared cultural value from a value system totally inimical to Americas own, and one that its adherents will simply refuse to abandon.

Its easy because, in part, mass media is the primary way that this audience sees other groups. Theyre not on the border, and they (or their parents) left cities like Detroit long ago. Perhaps its ironic that white people, who themselves retreated from pluralism en masse in the mid-20th-century there goes the neighborhood are now the ones believing that other spaces have been taken over by people alien or hostile to them, that there are now places in their own country they simply cannot go for fear of being targeted for violence.

The combination of not living quite close enough to people who are different, but living within close enough range to see things they might have done wrong on local news, is potent. It leads to absurd memes like the knockout game (the suburban legend that gangs of black teens were going around punching random white strangers in the head). It leads to fake news like European towns that have become no-go zones for non-Muslims. It leads to the US president saying that MS-13 has taken over whole cities in the US, and that the federal government needs to liberate those towns for its citizens.

If there are places that are simply forsaken to some Americans, places so alien to them that their very existence is a threat, diversity seems either already dead or not worth keeping alive.

Pluralism is a hard question. Of course its a hard question. But when you look at a few hundred refugees on Manus Island and see the beginnings of an inevitable horde that will overflow your country, you lose any perspective on that question. You lose any faith in pluralism entirely. All you have, instead, is a desperate need to cling to an America you deem so fragile it cant bear one extra inch of stretch or ounce of weight. Its a neurotic, smothering love.

Read more here:
The Trump administration is waging war on diversity - Vox

SAN FRANCISCO The Giants trudged onto the field for the team photo Thursday afternoon. Some of their personnel found a way to smile. Manager Bruce Bochy was among them.

But upon meeting with reporters, Bochys smile vanished. He heaved an audible sigh.

It stinks, letting guys go, Bochy said.

In addition to Conor Gillaspie, the hero of last Octobers NL Wild Card Game, Bochy had to deliver bad news to two other veterans. He said right-hander Matt Cain would be out of the rotation and would serve as a long reliever for the remainder of the season. And he acknowledged that his chat with Denard Span on Monday involved telling the career center fielder to brace for a move to left field.

The move with Span might not take place in earnest until spring training, Bochy said. The move with Cain is more immediate. Right-hander Chris Stratton will start in place of Cain on Saturday against the Arizona Diamondbacks and the plan calls for him to remain in the rotation for the rest of the season.

This is the tough thing about going through a year like this, Bochy said of managing a 41-68 club. It comes with the territory, (making) changes.

Bochy delivered some of the bad news after Wednesday nights loss to the As, telling Gillaspie that he would be designated for assignment. Gillaspie, 30, batted .163 in 44 games while battling back stiffness. His defense at third base had slipped as well. He couldnt throw out 38-year-old Chase Utley on a roller at Dodger Stadium on Saturday, which started a ninth-inning rally that ultimately cost the Giants a win.

But Gillaspie still has something to offer a contending club, and Bochy hoped he would catch on somewhere.

Gillaspie hit a pair of late-inning home runs in recent days, including one with two outs in the ninth on July 21 that forced extra innings against the Padres. It was the kind of late-inning magic he displayed so often in late September and in the postseason last year.

His unforgettable home run off the Mets Jeurys Familia broke a scoreless tie and backed Madison Bumgarners shutout to get the Giants through the Wild Card knockout game. Then he hit a triple off the Cubs Aroldis Chapman that won Game 3 of the NL Division Series. It was the first triple a left-handed hitter had ever hit off Chapman, and it came on a 100.9 mph fastball the swiftest pitch that Gillaspie had seen in his major league career.

Special stuff, in other words. And it happened in his second tour with the Giants, coming back with a much different mindset after failing to establish himself the first time around just as Travis Ishikawa did when he hit the home run that clinched the pennant in 2014.

But baseball games are won because of production, not memories. The reminder was just as brusque for Gillaspie as it was for Ishikawa in 2015.

Its always difficult, Bochy said. As you know, he did a lot for us last year, especially down the stretch. A club can pick him up. If not, I hope hes in Sacramento.

Ryder Jones is up from Sacramento, hitting second in Thursdays lineup against the As and Bochy expects to play him almost every day. The way is clear for Jones at third base after the club let Gillaspie go and optioned Jae-gyun Hwang back to the River Cats. But Bochy said Jones would get occasional starts in the outfield, too.

Jones, 23, hit .375 with three home runs in 11 games since the Giants activated him from the disabled list and returned him to Sacramento.

Hes swinging the bat better, Bochy said. Hes driving the ball. With where were at, this is a perfect time for him.

They have an opportunity in part because Christian Arroyo is out for likely the remainder of the season because of a fractured finger. Likewise, Stratton is getting a shot because top pitching prospect Tyler Beede is sidelined two months by a strained groin.

Hes a four-pitch guy, hes got some velo, low 90s, and when his command is sharp, he works up and down (the zone) pretty well, Bochy said of Stratton, who is 0-2 with a 7.71 ERA. Hes got a good slider and changeup. Hes got the equipment to be a 4 or 5 starter.

The Giants didnt promote left-hander Andrew Suarez because he has thrown 121 innings this season and he doesnt have to be added to the 40-man roster until after next season. Its not worth having him take up a space now when hell likely be shut down after throwing another 30-40 innings.

Perhaps the most significant future development involves Span, who couldnt make a play in the As two-run first inning Wednesday night and statistically ranks as the least effective center fielder in baseball.

Span is signed for one more season (with $13 million owed to him, including the buyout on an option for 2019), and if he is still here, Bochy left no doubt that his future would be in left field.

We had a discussion, Bochy said. Its hard to do during the season. More than likely, it happens next year. I cant tell you what will happen in the offseason. But we have talked about it.

Bochy said he is sensitive to the fact that the move from center field to an outfield corner is more difficult than one might presume, and he didnt want to throw Span into the fire. He mentioned that Angel Pagan needed an entire spring before he began to feel comfortable in left.

Bochy knows there is a pride factor as well. He has managed enough center fielders to know they often have a hard time seeing themselves as anything but a center fielder.

Jarrett Parker is back from his fractured collarbone, and played quite a bit of center field during his two rehab stints for Sacramento. But hes in left field Thursday as he makes his first start since the April 15 game in which he crashed into the wall while making a catch.

As for Hwang, he was 2 for 13 with a pair of singles in four starts upon being recalled and Bochy acknowledged the timing isnt there at the plate. Its been clear all along that the Giants werent counting on Hwang being a part of their long-term future.

Bochy said he anticipated that Hwang would return as a September call-up. But that doesnt mean Jones is free and clear at third base. The Giants have a certain Kung Fu Panda getting at-bats at Sacramento Pablo Sandoval set up his family in the Bay Area on his day off Wednesday and Bochy has said when the right time comes, itll happen.

One day after Daniel Gossett no-hit the Giants into the fifth inning in a 6-1 victory, the As sent him back to Triple-A. Its Kendall Graveman vs. Ty Blach as the Giants try to split this four-game home-and-home series with their interleague rivals.

Lineups:

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Giants notes: Bruce Bochy pulls Matt Cain from rotation, tells Denard Span his future is in LF - The Mercury News

Hull FC open their Super 8s account against Salford Red Devils at the KCOM Stadium. Sports editor James Smailes previews the game.

Asked how his side would approach the Super 8s in terms of setting goals, Lee Radford said Hull FC would wipe the slate clean and aim to be top of a new seven-game league table.

Its probably the best approach given a look down at the current Super League ladder is enough to put the frighteners on anyone outside of runaway leaders Castleford Tigers.

Lets put it in context. Should Hull lose to Salford Red Devils at the KCOM Stadium and the rest of round one go pretty much to form, FC could find themselves sixth in the table heading to St Helens next week, sitting just a point ahead of Wigan in seventh.

Such are the fine margins in this season of unpredictability and surprise, each round feels almost like a knockout game with so much riding on it.

Even Huddersfield Giants in eighth will hold a belief they can spoil the top-four party, and while those chances are slim, the race for the play-offs really is wide open.

Getting off to a good start is paramount and Hull have the chance to do just that against a Salford side who have impressed this season, but fallen off in terms of results and performance in the past two months.

The Red Devils have a point to prove after being knocked out of the Challenge Cup by Wigan and are desperate to show they can hold their pursuit of a top-four finish.

Likewise, Hull must prove lessons have been learned from last year. Theyve shown everyone the quality they possess, now they must show the necessary consistency and mental toughness to stay on course in the league as the Wembley arch looms large in the background.

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Starting the Super 8s with a win will go a long way to doing that. Just as a defeat could see Hull playing catch-up, so a win opens a three-point gap over Salford and regardless of results elsewhere keeps Radfords men in the driving seat.

As long as the performance is good enough to win was Radfords assessment of what he wants to see against Salford.

Hull dont have to play at their impressive best this evening, they just need to win and thats the case for the Super 8s as a whole.

If anything this side have shown they can turn it on when it counts in knockout games, they just need to make sure theyre in one come the conclusion of the Super 8s.

With injuries to Marc Sneyd, Mark Minichiello and Josh Bowden, Hull FC coach Lee Radford has made three enforced changes to his squad.

Jordan Thompson is expected to feature having been left out of the Challenge Cup semi-final victory, while Steve Michaels should also come into the side to allow Radford to freshen things up in his back division.

Jansin Turgut was the third alteration to the 19-man squad, but may have to sit out once again with Brad Fash in pole position to come into the 17-man squad having missed out last week as 18th man.

Salford have been dealt a blow after it was confirmed Lama Tasi has been ruled out for 10 weeks, effectively ending his 2017 season.

Its really frustrating to pick up an injury like this so late on in the season. Were coming up to crunch time with the Super 8s and to miss these sort of game is disappointing, said Tasi, who was suspended for the match at the KCOM Stadium anyway.

Fellow forward Mark Flanagan has also been ruled out for the season with a shoulder injury, but coach Ian Watson has half-back Robert Lui and centre Jake Bibby back.

Tyrone McCarthy and Manu Vatuvei are both set to make their Super League debuts.

If theres one attribute that Salford have plenty of in their locker its size when it comes to the outside backs.

The Red Devils are a big physical unit out wide, similar to Hull, and that makes the contest on either wing not just crucial but exciting to watch.

In that regard, the match-up between FCs Mahe Fonua and new Salford arrival Manu Vatuvei is going to be bring fireworks.

Vatuvei is expected to make his Super League debut having played in the Cup semi-final defeat last week. The Kiwi international is a monster out wide, but Hull have their own ace up their sleeve in that regard with Fonua.

Expect fireworks when these two clash.

Last ten meetings:

Salford 10, Hull FC 34 (SLR18, 9/6/17)

Hull FC 18, Salford 54 (SLR8, 7/4/17)

Salford 20, Hull FC 28 (SLR23, 22/7/16)

Hull FC 42, Salford 20 (SLR1, 5/2/16)

Hull FC 24, Salford 20 (SLR12, 1/5/15)

Salford 32, Hull FC 28 (SLR3, 28/2/15)

Salford 35, Hull FC 22 (SLR20, 12/7/14)

Hull FC 36, Salford 37 (aet) (CCR4, 3/4/14)

Hull FC 30, Salford 8 (SLR7, 28/3/14)

Hull FC 18, Salford 13 (SLR25, 16/8/13)

Super League summary

Hull FC won 31

Salford won 9

Hull FC highest score: 82-6 (H, 2004) (also widest margin)

Salford highest score: 54-18 (A, 2017) (also widest margin)

See the original post here:
Hull FC v Salford Red Devils big game preview, opinion, key battle and score prediction - Hull Daily Mail

The Octavio Zambrano era has gotten off to a near-perfect start for Canada.

Since the Ecuadorian took over the program in March, the team has yet to experience a loss. In fact, the Canucks have not tasted defeat in 2017, with the unbeaten streak extended to six games thanks to a scoreless draw with Honduras last week in Canada's final group stage match at the 2017 CONCACAF Gold Cup.

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The positivity, while modest, will continue for a few more days at least, with Zambrano's squad preparing to face Jamaica in the tournament quarterfinals on Thursday in Glendale, Ariz. It'll be the first of two meetings between the sides over the summer, as the teams will also square off in a friendly at Toronto's BMO Field in early September.

If it wasn't obvious, Thursday's match is the far more important of the two against the Jamaicans.

The Caribbean nation claimed the most recent meeting between these two sides, securing a 1-0 victory in the 2015 Gold Cup thanks to a stoppage time goal. Canada looks to exact some revenge on Thursday, riding a newfound confidence under the new coach that saw the beleaguered team finally break a number of embarrassing tournament droughts (goals, wins, advancement to the knockout stage) en route to this week's clash.

For their part, the Canadians aren't idly accepting advancement to the quarters as the end goal. Cyle Larin, the 22-year-old former MLS rookie of the year who plies his trade for Orlando City, has been summoned by Zambrano to replace midfielder/defender Raheem Edwards in the squad. The move signifies a commitment to the type of attacking soccer that Zambrano promised when he took the reins earlier this year, glimpses of which we've seen on display in the group stage.

Larin will be in tough to crack the starting lineup as Lucas Cavallini has performed admirably as a tireless force up front, harassing defenders and providing link-up play that has resulted in teenage sensation Alphonso Davies' first of three goals so far in the tournament.

Regardless, Larin will be another weapon at Zambrano's disposal, as Canada looks to claim a very realistic opportunity to move on to the semifinals of the regional competition for the first time since 2007.

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Even if Thursday is the end of the road for the Canadians, this year's Gold Cup will have to be looked upon as a success. Zambrano has managed to introduce several new players to the fold, with young players like Davies, Michael Petrasso, Samuel Adekugbe and Mark-Anthony Kaye having notable Gold Cup debuts. Along with the likes of Scott Arfield, Junior Hoilett and Steven Vitoria all veterans who are still relatively inexperienced in international play Canada has managed to give its player pool a much-needed infusion of new talent at a time when several of the more familiar faces from the past decade are transitioning away from the national team.

Zambrano's task is to essentially prepare the Canadians for World Cup qualification for Qatar 2022, which won't begin for another 2-3 years. In the time leading up to those matches, it's all about exposing young talent to the rigours of international action while forging an identity upon which the program can be based.

Gold Cup 2017 is just the first step, and there is plenty of work to be done, but it's already been a giant leap forward.

The rest is here:
Canada is back! Canucks ready for first Gold Cup knockout game ... - Yahoo Sports