Canadian men’s national team coach John Herdman has repeatedly promised that the boys in red will be going to Qatar for the 2022 FIFA World Cup. He talks about qualifying for a tournament that Canada has only got to once before as a 100 per-cent certainty.

But, to achieve that objective, one thing Canada does not have to do is to be better than Mexico. The Canadians just need to be in CONCACAF’s best-of-the-rest pack. That’s the goal.

It’s something they couldn’t do in the previous World Cup qualifying cycle. And no one in Canada complained that the national team lost twice to Mexico in World Cup qualifying. The issue was that the team couldn’t nip Honduras for second place in their group.

Let’s face it, this year’s Gold Cup is not a be-all, end-all tournament for the Canadian program. For a program that’s still in the early stages of its development, this tournament is simply a part of a longer process. The big takeaway is that each game preps the team for World Cup qualifiers to come. This is about making sure Canada can be at the top of what looks to be a wide-open CONCACAF field, behind Mexico, when the big games that decide who will be going to Qatar will be played.

Behind Mexico are the two key words here.

So, Wednesday’s 3-1 Gold Cup loss in Denver, or “La Ciudad a Una Milla de Altura” to the partisan crowd, shouldn’t freak us out too much. Canada’s job is to finish second in Group A. This was the goal coming in. It’s still the goal. (Note the “Behind Mexico” theme.) Canada has already throttled Martinique and should romp over Cuba Sunday.

While Mexico was clearly the better side, in those black jerseys that made them more like DC United of the 1990s than El Tri, it was a substitute made out of necessity that changed the game. Midfielder Erick Gutierrez was forced to leave in the first half due to what looked like a hamstring issue. Veteran Andres Guardado was brought in to replace him.

Guardado would go on to score twice. Oof.

The whole game had a surreal feel to it. Mexico wearing kits that had no green or red in them. An injury leading to a game-changing sub. And Canada coming out with a formation that felt a bit like names had been picked out of a hat.

But was Herdman being crazy like a fox? He decided that now was not the time to show the Mexicans how Canada will really stack up. He started Cyle Larin, a prototypical centre-forward, on the wing. He continued to experiment with Atiba Hutchinson in the centre of defence. He decided to leave the likes of red-hot striker Jonathan David, and midfield cogs Jonathan Osorio and Scott Arfield, on the bench to start the game. And we’re still not really sure where Herdman really wants Alphonso Davies to play. Is he a forward or a fullback? Maybe Davies will one day get stuck in goal, just to round things out.

Really, it wasn’t until well into the second half, when David, Arfield and Osorio were introduced and the formation was changed to a 4-3-3, that we caught a glimpse of how Canada will possibly look when it plays the big boys in CONCACAF.

The take? Treat the first two-thirds of the match as a big bluff from Herdman. Canada has little to prove against El Tri, so why not try something totally off-book? Because, at no time leading up to 2022, will Canada be competing directly against Mexico. They’ll be competing to be No. 2 in CONCACAF. Or three.