The long road to Brazil 2014 World Cup continues in CONCACAF with an absolutely vital match for both teams, as Honduras coming off a shocking home defeat to Panama travel to BMO Field in Toronto to take on a Canadian squad looking to build off a key victory away to Cuba.

Canada comes into this match off the back of a crucial 1-0 victory over Cuba, the match was far from what you would consider a display of the “beautiful game” but was the typical CONCACAF match that consisted of sweltering heat & humidity and horrible pitch conditions. With all that said the Canucks deserved to take all three points and set themselves up with a golden opportunity at home, if they are able to follow up the good road result with another win it will be a giant step forward in the quest to make it to the fourth and final round of qualification known commonly as “The Hexagonal Phase”. Coach Stephen Hart will have liked much of what he saw from his team; however one of the more unfortunate things he’ll have to deal with is a red card suspension to his goalkeeper Lars Hirschfeld who handled the ball outside the box. The key players for Canada in this match are forward Olivier Occean who scored the winning goal in Cuba, midfielder Atiba Hutchinson who looks to have recovered from injury and midfielder Dwayne De Rosario who is the chief playmaker and table setter.

As for Honduras they fell in really surprising fashion at home against Panama by a 2-0 score line, while losing to Panama who is the up and coming nation in CONCACAF is not an embarrassment to drop those points at home applies unnecessary pressure. This team under Coach Luis Suarez are in transition, as many of the key players that took part in the 2010 World Cup are being phased out and they have gone to more of a youth movement. That said much of this team still has experience with players like midfielder Wilson Palacios, defender Emilio Izaguirre and forward Carlo Costly all have vital roles and bring a variety of skill sets to the table. Although Palacios is far from the player he was a few years ago he will likely have the task of tracking the runs of De Rosario, Izaguirre is arguably the best fullback in CONCACAF and is a legit threat when joining the attack and on his day Costly can be a handful for any defense in this region to deal with. The loss to Panama means they need to win this game to get back on track, dropping points won’t mean the end but it will make an already difficult situation even more uncomfortable.

The odds aren’t out for this match yet but this is a key match between two hated CONCACAF rivals, there is a lot of history between these two and adding Honduras’ shocking loss to Panama in the equation and an already hostile match could get nasty. As a Canadian you already know who I side with in this rivalry, however the two things that are a guarantee is this match will be more beast than beauty and CONCACAF officiating will play its role in some form or fashion.