Just 10 minutes into the second half of its second match at the Yongchuan Cup, the Canadian national women's team itself down by three goals to the world-16th ranked South Koreans.

Seven players who have yet to play a senior “A” match for the women’s national team have been named to what has to be called an experimental Canadian roster ahead of the Yongchuan Cup.

“The Whitecaps are investing younger,” he said. “They are using the funding they had and were using on W-League and using it on players who are 14 to 17. Strategically, it makes a lot of sense.”

“The emblem of a competition is an important step on the road to the first game,” said FIFA President Sepp Blatter in a message that was recorded for the launch event.

Christine Sinclair has won the Lou Marsh Award as Canada’s top athlete of 2012.

And while many within the soccer community will say the Sinclair choice should have been an obvious one, there was one major distinction between Canada’s greatest soccer player and the rest of the field.

But women’s national-team coach John Herdman isn’t so sure. Instead or rosy prognostications about women’s soccer in Canada, he said it’s time for us to lower our expectations, as time has come for the program to take a few lumps.

But, in FIFA’s eyes — they are both controversial figures. And if there is one thing we have learned about FIFA, black sheep rarely get recognized.

When the result of voting for FIFA’s women’s player of the year is revealed Jan. 7, it will be a referendum of sorts.

It was suffragist Nellie McClung who uttered one of the most famous lines in Canadian history “Never retract, never explain, never apologize--get the thing done and let them howl.” That statement could apply to Sinclair.