Jesse Marsch confirms Alphonso Davies will miss March CanMNT camp despite larger squad call-up
Canadian Men's National Team head coach Jesse Marsch confirmed Thursday his star player and captain Alphonso Davies will not travel to Toronto for upcoming friendlies against Iceland and Tunisia in late March, with the Bayern Munich defender picking up yet another injury for his club earlier in the week.
Davies, who had been sidelined with a torn ACL through much of 2025, returned to the field earlier in the year, but was sidelined in February after picking up a torn hamstring against Eintracht Frankfurt in Bundesliga action. He then once again returned about 3 weeks later, but picked up another right leg injury against Atalanta on Tuesday, ruling him out for the March window.
“I spoke to him today," Marsch told TSN 1050 Overdrive. "He’s obviously down and frustrated a little bit, but he said this little injury, compared to even the one he experienced a month ago is much less severity. He’ll probably be 2, 3 weeks before he’s back again.
"What it highlights is when you come off these long-term injuries, just managing things and being a little more cautious so you don’t have setbacks."
Marsch added: "He’s probably not going to be with us for March, which is okay. We’ll probably leave him there in Munich and make sure he gets himself fully fit and fully back to 100%, but I’m confident that he will do that.
"Along with his frustration, my message to him was, like, just stay positive. It’s not easy when you come back from these long-term injuries. You’re gonna be fine. You’re young. You’re strong. We just need to take the appropriate steps to make sure that we don’t have anymore set-backs.”
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Davies isn't the only Canadian international facing injuries, with Marsch's squad selection hampered with both long- and short-term unavailability to key starts like Alistair Johnston, Moise Bombito, Derek Cornelius, Promise David and, most recently, Stephen Eustaquio, who missed LAFC's last match with a minor issue.
When asked about this injury crisis, Marsch said he remains optimistic his group will be ready for the 2026 World Cup in June. He also confirmed that the March roster will feature many of these injured players, who may not feature but will be included in the group as the team continues to prepare for the summer tournament.
"There’s a lot of guys who’ve had some long-term injuries," Marsch said. Stephen Eustaquio’s fine. He may feature this weekend, and for sure he’ll feature mid-week next week... but, yeah, we have a lot to manage.
"In March, we’re going to bring in a little bit of a bigger group, to include some of these injured players and in their return-to-play protocol, so they might not feature in games, but we want ‘em around the team.
"We still have enough time where guys have the ability to recover and get themselves back to 100% - or at least close to 100% - by June. So it’s a little bit of a crunch time with the injury situation, but we also have a really big squad now. It’s different than years past. There’s a lot of really good young players that are establishing themselves in Europe and the team has performed well no matter who’s been on the pitch. But, certainly, we want to get all our best players as close to 100% fit as possible come June 1st, and certainly June 12th.”
