World Cup Qualifiers: Canada vs USMNT Preview, Odds, Total Goals, and 4 Bonus FIFA Picks

If the United States Men’s National Team were a college football outfit, their next game would be against Old Dominion, followed by the Florida Gators, followed by New Mexico State. If the USMNT were match-play golfing, their next opponent would be Stewart Cink, followed by a rejuvenated Dustin Johnson, followed by “Al” So-Ran from the pits of the Japanese tour. If the USMNT…

Okay, okay. Before we get all the way down to curling and table tennis, I’ll assume you get it. U.S. soccer faces its toughest test since autumn on Sunday, January 30, traveling northward to face a Canada side which has improved its defending against the Yanks in great strides over the course of 3 matches.

Meanwhile, lower-tier CONCACAF sides Honduras and El Salvador are paired against USMNT in the same round of FIFA World Cup qualifying on Thursday 1/27 and Wednesday 2/2 respectively. Speculators should not assume that favored Yankee footballers are the only folks who might overlook the USMNT’s crucial fixtures with Los Catrachos and La Selecta. Gamblers are just as prone to distraction when a single “big” match lurks in a round of what are all important bouts.

There are also 2 ways to look at the USMNT’s unsteady lineup quality in 2021-22. Some supporters may be asking heaven why, oh why so many Stars & Stripes up-and-comers would be restricted to a European football schedule and unavailable to play or train a plurality of the time, just as the United States has the potential to field its best squad of a generation and make noise in the 2022 World Cup. Surely the U.S. team would have had a better chance to defeat Jamaica on November 16th if the starting lineup hadn’t included a pair of teenagers among the 3 forwards fronting the USA formation, even though 1 of the youngsters, talented Timothy Weah of Ligue 1, salvaged a draw with a goal.

On the other hand, U.S. soccer doesn’t want to be “Wigan Athletic in the FA Cup,” totally maxing-out for every appearance, while trying to redefine Team USA on the world soccer stage. National teams, just like elite club teams, ought to be able to win as necessary with 2nd and 3rd-best lineups on the pitch. Ideally, victories earned with youthful lineups can serve as watershed “growth” experiences for national squad newcomers, such as midfielder Cole Bassett’s late winner in a recent friendly vs Bosnia.

🇺🇸 Com um time basicamente formado por jogadores da MLS, sem "europeus", a seleção dos Estados Unidos venceu a Bósnia por 1 a 0 na noite de ontem.

Gol de uma das revelações da MLS, Cole Bassett.

pic.twitter.com/Wthw36HkWb

— MLS Brasil 🇧🇷 (@MLS__Brasil) December 19, 2021

The return of Premier League forwards Christian Pulisic and Josh Sargent will send Over/Under “total goals” lines upward and USMNT money-line odds shrinking for the 2nd-from-last round of 3 CONCACAF qualifiers. USA supporters will be excited, but not so much if they’re betting.

At least not right away, that is. The promise of something akin to an “A” lineup for Stars & Stripes (and other prominent national teams) has online bookmakers shy to handicap all of the upcoming FIFA schedule. Analysts want to see how the real thing looks before setting odds out into February.

That stinks for those of us hoping to get an early bead on the weekend’s FIFA odds. However, there are enough betting lines out of London and Las Vegas for Thursday and Friday’s fixtures that some type of formidable USMNT match-gambling strategy can begin to convalesce.

Especially if we draw from – and expound on – recent World Cup qualifier odds along the way.

World Cup Qualifiers: Betting Odds, Line Forecasts, and Predictions

United States vs El Salvador (Thursday 1/27)

Sin City gives Stars & Stripes bright odds to win outright on Thursday, marking the United States a (-420) money-line favorite to earn 3 points and ensure top-2 position in the FIFA “Americas” qualifying group headed into Sunday’s showdown in Canada. USMNT hasn’t just grown in the mental game since drawing 0-0 with El Salvador back in September, as such a youthful squad can’t help but get a little faster and stronger over a 6-month span. The disappointing 1-point result is still recent enough (and meaningful enough to keep the United States out of 1st place) that there’s no way manager Gregg Berhalter or any of the squad’s vocal leaders will be bound to overlook El Salvador this time.

Even so, bettors must be wary of a “trap” scenario while contemplating a 1-to-4 pick on the Americans to win. La Selecta gave the United States problems without the football in the previous match, despite a lineup that included Sargent up front with a stronger supporting cast at his back. USMNT committed an ugly 19 fouls thanks to poor positioning, and only possessed the ball for 49% of the 90+ minutes.

Ironically, the United States might have been a better wager against El Salvador and other FIFA underdogs prior to the development of EPL-level talent on the Stars & Stripes squad. There was an era in which Team USA desperately needed to beat every opponent on El Salvador and Honduras’ level. Berhalter’s steady, patient decision making in the face of fall outcomes like “Panama 1, USA 0” illustrates that the main goal of U.S. soccer is no longer defeating other blue-collar squads and hoping to eke-out a spot in the World Cup, but rather to prepare a best-11 (or “best 15”) to play and defeat Mexico and Canada, and ultimately knock the FIFA Q-cycle out of the park.

The USA has a chance to do just that – at the cost of being a solid 1/4 pick in a preliminary.

A wiser angle on Thursday’s match focuses on El Salvador’s wan attack, which has scored only 4 goals in 8 qualification matches this cycle. Given how poorly the Yanks defended in the previous match, we can expect an increasingly star-studded midfield to play methodical football on Thursday, and work to overcome any opposing counter-play that occurs due to inexperience with forward numbers.

FanDuel’s 1/1 payoff on O/U (2.5) total goals is erroneous in how standard it is. It’s not a sure thing that USMNT will score 2-3 goals, but it will be highly challenging for El Salvador to come up with 3+ meaningful shots on-target and pierce the Yanks for a costly goal-against.

Pick: Under (2.5)

Jamaica vs Mexico (Thursday 1/27)

An entertaining kickoff in Jamaica will quickly follow the United States vs El Salvador opening whistle. El Tricolor isn’t nearly the same kind of favorite at (-150) as the USMNT is for its Thursday meeting, despite the Jamaicans having drawn with El Salvador (and the USA!) in November.

Can bookmakers be blamed for anxiety over Team Mexico? El Tri just hasn’t gotten its mojo back since being forced to split senior squads for the Summer Olympics and CONCACAF Gold Cup in 2021. Supporters were frustrated when Mexico failed to produce a point vs Panama on October 8th, aghast when El Tri spoiled a potentially easy romp over El Salvador with a red card, and proven all-too-correct in their concerns as Mexico went winless in its next (and most recent) 4 matches.

Jamaica vs Mexico is harder to predict than a “David vs Goliath” match-up like El Salvador’s forwards vs USMNT’s back line. In a stroke of good fortune, FanDuel’s odds-makers appear to have booked themselves into a corner with the prop odds on a tense appearance. Payoff odds in O/U total-goals markets and FanDuel’s innovative “Handicap Draw” goal spread indicate a Las Vegas score prediction of 2-1 in favor of Mexico. Yet the odds on a 2-1 “Exact Score” bet are cautious at about 8/1, and should Mexico score an insurance goal late in the match, 3-1 scores pay off at (+1600) on prop bets.

Picks: Mexico 2-1, Mexico 3-1 (Exact Score Prop Bets) 

Honduras vs Canada (Thursday 1/27)

Bovada Sportsbook’s odds-makers appear uncertain whether Canada (+115) can defeat Honduras in a hostile setting and claim 3 needed points to keep Les Rouges atop the FIFA Americas table.

Honduras, after all, frustrated the Canucks earlier in 2022 World Cup qualifiers in what was regretfully among the most physical, unsightly matches of this CONCACAF cycle.

Cyle Larin scoring a 1st-half tally is something Team Canada supporters can virtually set their watches by. 40 total fouls and nearly 50 squandered Canuck strikes and corner-kick attempts? Hopefully, that’s not a trend that will continue as Canada mounts a promising bid to reach Qatar.

Canada’s 1-1 draw with Honduras proved that a North American side can’t win by hitting, hacking, and whiffing on the broad side of a barn. But other statistics from the same match showed that Honduras’ midfield couldn’t earn possession no matter how many free-kicks and set-pieces helped. It may simply take a more cool-headed performance for Canada to win the rematch outright, as the Canucks are in solid psychological stead for road fixtures after 8 mostly solid appearances and a fat point total.

Pick: Canada (+115)

Colombia vs Peru (Friday 1/28)

Soccer bookmakers are nothing if not aware of recent developments. Colombia’s attack finally showed signs of life in a recent 2-1 victory over Honduras, as the veteran midfielder Juan Fernando Quintero got Coffee Growers on the scoreboard just 10 minutes into the match. The team’s Friday qualifier opponent, Peru, is a sizable underdog on the betting board.

But the (+182) payoff odds on Under (1.5) goals at FanDuel make us wonder if enough odds-makers have sat through Colombia’s fixtures waiting for somebody, anybody to score. Prior to the 3-goal-total CONCACAF-CONBEMOL friendly, the Colombians played nearly 6 full matches without scoring a single time. The nation’s reputation for defending remains on par with Italy, England, and Switzerland, and so it was that every Coffee Growers qualifier in October and November finished in a 0-0 draw, except for a “wide-open corker” on November 11th in which Brazil somehow managed 1 goal.

The team’s issue with reliance on footballers like Quintero is underscored by the 29-year old’s tally in the Honduras appearance. Quintero’s speed and quickness diminished as a 20-something European club prospect, and the midfielder has manufactured only rudimentary numbers with the football since flushing out of Ligue 1 in 2017 and returning to South America. Miguel Borja’s 2-goal outing vs Chile in September marked the first time in more than a year that a Columbia National Team forward had so much as threatened a hat trick on the pitch. As is often the case, Coffee Growers boast all kinds of fundamentals and 22-up depth to spare, but can’t find the opposing net.

Juan Valdez needs to start “hand picking” some strikers.

Pick: Under (1.5) (+182)

Canada vs USA (Sunday, January 30) Line Forecasting

USMNT’s (-175) odds to beat Canada on September 5th may have been too optimistic in hindsight, and WagerBop isn’t just arguing that because the final score wound up to be 1-1.

Odds-makers were awed by the development of strikers like Pulisic and Sargent, and ready to handicap Team USA as a foremost CONCACAF power. But a squad’s roster upgrade takes time to begin to show up on qualification ledgers in most instances, because elite athletes must take on new clearly-defined roles as other stars arrive to take touches. Pulisic, for instance, has spent the last 2 cycles of Stars & Stripes competition running all over the place with the ball, serving as the team’s most dangerous forward even when technically slotted-in at midfielder. That stops now, given a solid supporting cast and Berhalter’s determination to preserve and protect a dynamic starting-11 for big matches.

It’s easier for a club team to add 4 or 5 excellent players and see results right away, given weeks upon consecutive weeks of training and live-fire combat. International squads are a longer project, considering that the coaching and training is part-time.

USMNT is gamer for Canada’s challenge now than it was in late summer. However, if the United States enjoys 1-to-2 odds (or even a “minus” moneyline) to beat Larin’s squad outright on Sunday, those odds could prove to be just as faulty in their sunny optimism. Not because Pulisic isn’t ready to lead the best United States men’s team we’ve all watched in a long while, but for more “London” reasons.

Think of Berhalter’s plan like Tiger Woods aiming to peak at The Masters. “Amen Corner” is the Canada match, and so there’s no doubt USMNT’s strongest lineup will be on the pitch in Ontario. Yet a sportsbook can’t merely set odds based on its handicappers’ prediction on a match. Bovada and FanDuel, among others, must also consider what gamblers are likely to do.

Casual bettors drawn to the intensifying FIFA cycle won’t know how to process a 1-1 draw or even a staid 1-0 victory for Team USA in Thursday’s match. If the lineup’s 2022 debut is discouraging in any way, headlines will prompt weekend betting action that pure analysis can’t hold a candle to. Bookmakers who are concerned about causing a “gold rush” of USMNT bets if the squad’s money-line odds are offered near 1/1 should think again. Less-experienced punters could conclude that (-120) is a thin, pricey line after watching a formative Team USA get off to a slow start vs El Salvador.

Looks like most of Las Vegas will be watching Thursday’s match, even if those in front of TVs aren’t fond of CONCACAF matches. A lot of betting numbers will ride on the outcome.

Update 1/28: As expected, a slow start and 1-0 victory for the United States on Thursday has led to a fat (+165) money-line market on the Yanks to win in Canada on Sunday.

WagerBop will take that bet – but when USMNT supporters and pundits quit overreacting to everything, let me know…and thank Lucifer for the frozen treats and ice cubes.

Official Pick: USMNT to defeat Canada (+165)