Decision made: Akindele on Canadian roster for WCQ By Steven Sandor Posted on June 2, 2015 4 0 1,040 Share on Facebook Share on Twitter Tesho Akindele The decision has been made. FC Dallas forward Tesho Akindele has chosen to represent Canada. (Akindele will now be removed from the list of “maybes” and into “sure things” in the upcoming editions of The 11‘s weekly Quintessentially Canadian ower Rankings) Akindele’s name is on the roster for Canada’s upcoming qualifiers against Dominica; June 11 in Roseau and June 16 at Toronto’s BMO Field. If he gets on the field, the Calgary-born attacker will be tied to Canada. Akindele has scored 10 times in 39 career MLS games for FC Dallas, and was named the MLS Rookie of the Year in 2014. He was invited to a Canadian camp last autumn, but chose instead to wait and see on a possible invite to a United States men’s national-team camp. But, earlier this year, Canadian national-team head coach Benito Floro told the media that he was “99.9 per cent” certain that Akindele would play for Canada. “This is a very important moment for Canadian soccer and Canada as a country,” said Floro. He said it would be a mistake to consider Dominica an “easy” opponent and that the team has to be “serious.” “We’ve been following performances. To come before, was a problem… I made a decision to call Tesho to an official camp. Because if he was in condition to say yes, it would be better… We called Tesho into an official camp and he decided to play for Canada.” Floro said that turning down an invite to a World Cup qualifier is a lot different than turning down a camp ahead of a friendly, as Akindele did last fall. If Akindele had turned down a WCQ call, Floro said he would have know the player’s answer was a definitive no. So, when the stakes were raised, Akindele decided to follow his Canadian roots. While he said that it’s not 100 per cent sure, Floro said he was confident that this will be the roster that Canada utilizes for the upcoming Gold Cup, as well. CANADA ROSTER GK- Milan Borjan | SRB / Radnicki Nis GK- Lars Hirschfeld | NOR / Vålerenga GK- Kenny Stamatopoulos | SWE / AIK D- Nana Attakora | USA / San Antonio Scorpions D- Manjrekar James | HUN / Pécsi MFC D- Dejan Jakovic | JPN / Shimizu S-Pulse D- Ashtone Morgan | CAN / Toronto FC D- Karl W. Ouimette | USA / New York Red Bulls D/M- David Edgar | ENG / Birmingham City FC (on loan at Huddersfield Town) D/M- Nik Ledgerwood | GER / Energie Cottbus D/M- Adam Straith | NOR / Fredrikstad FK D/M- Maxim Tissot | CAN / Impact de Montréal M- Julian de Guzman | CAN / Ottawa Fury FC M- Atiba Hutchinson | TUR / Besiktas M- Will Johnson | USA / Portland Timbers M- Jonathan Osorio | Toronto FC M- Samuel Piette | ESP / Deportivo la Coruña M- Russell Teibert | CAN / Vancouver Whitecaps FC M/F-Tosaint Ricketts | ISR / Hapoel Haifa F- Tesho Akindele | USA / FC Dallas F- Randy Edwini-Bonsu | GER / Stuttgarter Kickers F- Marcus Haber | ENG / Crewe Alexandra F- Cyle Larin | USA / Orlando City SC
