MEDIA CALL: Alphonso Davies out for June 12, Promise to make CanMNT 🇨🇦 World Cup + more 🎙️
With the release of the CanMNT’s 32-player training camp squad on Monday, head coach Jesse Marsch took the time to speak to the media after that announcement, allowing him to peel back the curtain when it comes to some of the decisions he made about that squad, which has convened in Charlotte this week.
ROSTER DROP 🚨
— OneSoccer (@onesoccer) May 25, 2026
Here is Jesse Marsch's 32-player CanMNT 🇨🇦 squad for the team's pre-tournament training camp in Charlotte, ahead of June friendlies vs. Uzbekistan and Ireland and a World Cup squad announcement on May 29 👀 pic.twitter.com/CqReT0n31Y
Given that Canada is set to reveal their final 26-player squad later this week, it was a good chance to gain some insight into how Marsch is feeling about his team ahead of the official squad drop, which will be made on May 29th.
Here’s what stood out from his media availability, which included several key injury updates and other important comments on the status of the team heading into the start of their pre-World Cup camp.
Alphonso Davies will join the group in Edmonton:
Naturally, a big area of focus was surrounding Alphonso Davies, as the CanMNT’s captain’s status has been up in the air ever since he sustained a hamstring injury earlier this month, one that put him in a race against time to return for the World Cup.
After an injury-ridden season, as he dealt with multiple muscle ailments that all stemmed from his recovery from an ACL tear, many people feared that this latest setback could cost him the World Cup.
Based on Marsch’s comments, though, that doesn’t appear to be something that he’s too worried about quite yet - although he admitted that it’s unlikely that Davies is ready for Canada’s World Cup opener on June 12th, even if he’s slated to join the group when they shift to Edmonton for the first of two pre-World Cup friendlies, as they take on Uzbekistan at Commonwealth Stadium on June 1st.
“Alphonso will join us on May 31st in Edmonton,” Marsch said. “We spoke with Bayern and thought that the best thing for him was to continue his initial recovery treatment until May 28th, then we're giving him a few days to get away, and then he'll be joining us on the 31st, and we'll pick up his rehab from there to try to put him in a position to physically succeed and to be part of our team.”
“We're excited, because we haven't seen him in a while. I’ve visited him a few times, but I think for the team it'll be a real boost to have him back in the group, and we'll be pushing to get him fit and strong and healthy, so he can contribute to our matches.”
“I don't think he'll be ready quite on June 12th, but we'll see,” Marsch later added.
Promise David is “going to make the squad.”
Otherwise, another player that Marsch honed in on was striker Promise David, who suffered a hip injury that required surgery at the end of February, ruling him out of the rest of Union St-Gilloise’s 2025-2026 campaign.
Given a timeline of three to six months to recover after the injury, it appears that David is on schedule to return on the earlier end of that prognostication, as Marsch said that the hulking striker is trending to be ready to go for the start of the World Cup.
“He is looking incredibly strong; he trained all last week here with us,” Marsch said. “He did a lot of fitness. He looks fitter than he's ever looked since we've known him. He looks as close to 100% as we could hope, like he's going to make the squad, and he's going to be ready for June 12, I’m certain of that.”
Marsch issues other injury updates:
Of course, Davies and David aren’t the only Canadian players returning from injuries, as Canada has over a half-dozen players who are dealing with some sort of ailment at the moment.
Because of that, Marsch took the time to dive into the status of all of those players, issuing relatively positive updates on all of them.
Firstly, he talked about Moïse Bombito, who hasn’t featured for club or country since suffering a fractured leg in October, although he recently returned to training for OGC Nice - based on Marsch’s comments, he’s set to play in Canada’s pre-World Cup friendlies, which is massive news.
“(Bombito) is trending in an incredibly positive direction,” Marsch said. “He played 32 minutes in our test match (this weekend) against the Charlotte Independence. He's feeling great, he's looking great. He's looking like himself more and more every day. He's going to have a full week of training, and I think he'll be ready for minutes in the Uzbekistan friendly, maybe even 45 (minutes).”
Then, he spoke about Alfie Jones, who has been out since January after having ankle surgery, an injury that was only supposed to keep him out for a couple of months, not the rest of the campaign.
The good news, though, is that after missing Middlesbrough’s dramatic end to the 2025-2026 Championship campaign, Jones is trending in the right direction to have a chance at making Canada’s World Cup squad, as he was well on track to do before this injury.
“We've made incredible progress with (Jones),” Marsch said. “He's been in our camp or in our care for over two weeks, and we think we identified the exact problem that's going on, and so he'll be in a lot of full training this week, and I think be preparing himself to be ready for the squad.”
Elsewhere, Marsch issued quick updates on a few other players to round things off.
First, he said that Ali Ahmed is “ahead of schedule” after suffering a knock in Norwich City’s last game of the season, so he’ll be training this week, before saying that Richie Laryea will also be in full training this week after suffering a thigh injury at the end of April.
Then, he said that his team have been in close contact with LAFC’s doctors about Jacob Shaffelburg, who missed game action this week with an injury, suggesting that he believes he’ll be able to recover pretty quickly from that injury, before adding that Luc De Fougerolles is out of concussion protocol after suffering a head injury in a recent match for FCV Dender.
Lastly, Marsch said that Ralph Priso and Alistair Johnston, who both recently returned from injuries, look good and ready to go, while Derek Cornelius, who hasn’t featured in 2026 after being essentially frozen out of the first-team setup at Rangers, also looks to be in good shape despite how his season ended.
It’s not over for those not in the 32-player group:
Naturally, when looking at the 32-player list Marsch called in, a couple of absences loomed large - namely, the big ones were James Pantemis, Kamal Miller, Junior Hoilett and Theo Bair, who were all in the mix to be among the 26 players included in the World Cup squad.
In particular, Pantemis is seen as a big absence, given that he’s arguably been the top-performing CanMNT-eligible goalkeeper in 2026, but Marsch instead elected to stick with the trio of Dayne St. Clair, Maxime Crépeau and Owen Goodman as his goalkeepers, with the experience of St. Clair and Crépeau and Goodman’s potential the big reasons for that selection.
Yet, while this likely indicates the end of the road for Pantemis, Miller, Hoilett and Bair’s World Cup dreams, especially given that Marsch already needs to cut six players from his pre-World Cup camp, he didn’t close the door on anyone quite yet.
A unique intricacy of this World Cup is that coaches are allowed to make changes to their World Cup squad up until 24 hours before the start of the tournament due to injuries (and are allowed to bring in a new goalkeeper at any point during the tournament if an injury crops up at that position), and given Canada’s injury luck, it doesn’t seem impossible to imagine them perhaps needing to bring in a new player at the last minute.
Because of that, Marsch noted that he’s told everyone, even those not in this squad, to be ready, as they could still be called later down the line.
“I've told all of them to be ready, right?” Marsch said. “I had already told Jayden (Nelson) and Ralph (Priso) no, that they weren't going to be coming into this camp, and that changed, so you know each situation has been very flexible because things change.”
“I’ve told James very clearly that our strategy has been that the two established goalkeepers are clear, and that we're going to bring a younger goalkeeper for the future, and to prepare him,” Marsch added. “But if there was ever an injury, that he was the name that we would call immediately, and that he needs to be ready.”
Canada’s excited to take the field:
While most of the talk in this press conference was centered around player availability, and understandably so given Canada’s injury woes, Marsch did speak a bit about how he’s feeling ahead of the tournament.
It might not have been the most straightforward journey to get to this point, but now that the team has gathered, they can put all of the noise of the last few months behind them and focus on chasing their goal, which is to make a deep run this summer.
At the end of the day, everyone involved knows how important such a run could be for the sport in this country, and they’re embracing the pressure that comes with those expectations, something they’ll look to prove once the tournament kicks off next month.
“There's no reason why we can't have high expectations for ourselves, so calmly, like effectively in a disciplined way, we're going to make sure that we're ready for whatever challenges come our way, and we're really excited about that,” Marsch offered. “We're really excited about our group.”
