It was the postcard for how the World Cup, in one moment, can symbolize the coming together of nation and team unlike anything else.
It wasn’t the six goals that Canada scored, nor the almost certainty that the emphatic victory over Qatar on a picture-perfect day in Vancouver would send Canada to the knockout stage.
It was the moments after the heartbreaking injury to the midfielder Ismaël Koné that best conveyed Canada’s tournament so far. With his leg broken, Koné still managed to wave to supporters, a message to keep cheering on their team.
Nathan Saliba, who replaced Koné in the lineup, reacted accordingly when he scored the fourth goal of the afternoon. He grabbed his injured teammate’s jersey and held it aloft as the crowd at B.C. Place cheered his goal.
“In a moment like this, I don’t think they need me so much — they have each other,” the team’s American coach, Jesse Marsch, who was in tears after Koné’s injury, said after the game. “Their families are here and we have a family barbecue tomorrow and we will enjoy that and he will be on our minds.”
Tougher challenges may lie ahead — next up is Switzerland — but what was clear on Thursday is that Canada, nation and team, is showing the kind of spirit that could deliver further moments of ecstasy, even if agonies are also part of the journey.
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