With apologies to Jacqueline Susann, once is not enough for Pacific FC.
The defending champion opened the 2022 Canadian Premier League soccer season last week with a marquee 2-1 victory over Forge FC of Hamilton, Ont., in a reprise of the 2021 CPL championship game.
The Island club says it is looking for more today at 1 p.m. at Starlight Stadium against Valour FC of Winnipeg.
“It’s about our ambition and wanting more,” said PFC head coach James Merriman. “There was a lot going on last week with the ceremonial start, and the team performed very well and it was an all-around good start for us. We’ve got a great group, a hungry group that is trying to build off what we did.
“But it’s still early in the season and there are a lot of things we want to improve on and there is a lot of work to do.”
Even with the loss of veteran PFC back-line stalwarts Lukas MacNaughton and Kadin Chung to Toronto FC of Major League Soccer, the roster is still deep enough that two of last season’s defender mainstays, Abdou Samake and Jordan Haynes, only got into the opening game as late subs. That was because the back-line starters, sa国际传媒-capped new addition Amer Didic, former West Ham Academy and Cavalry CPL player Nathan Mavila, sa国际传媒 Under-23 Tokyo Olympic team CONCACAF qualifiers selection Thomas Meilleur-Giguere and veteran Kunle Dada-Luke played so well.
“It’s what we want in our group. It’s healthy to have that competition and guys battling for every position on the team,” said Merriman.
“That’s what is going to push us every day in the training environment and in keeping up our standards. We have a very deep squad with players with great attitudes. We are very day-to-day. The player that is consistently pushing in the training environment, and is most ready, is the player that we are going to put in. Everybody’s pushing. Everybody wants to play. That’s exactly where we want to be.”
Valour FC must recover from the crushing blow of a bicycle-kick wonder goal in its opener, scored by former Germany U-19 player and Dortmund prospect Tobias Warschewski deep in injury time, as FC Edmonton salvaged a 1-1 draw.
Andy Baquero had scored in the first half to give Valour FC the lead. The crafty midfielder, with 29 caps and five goals for Cuba in World Cup qualifying and CONCACAF Gold Cup play, will bear watching today by the PFC defenders.
“Valour had a good game, in my opinion, giving up only the goal late in the match. They are going to want something out of this weekend. Their last result is for sure motivation for them,” said Merriman.
“We need to be ready, especially after coming off a big performance ourselves. But that was the opening match of the season. Now it’s about our mentality coming into the second game. It’s an important match, as is every game is the league.”
CORNER KICKS: Striker Kamron Habibullah, on loan to PFC from the Vancouver Whitecaps of MLS and who made his Tridents debut last week against Forge FC, and Matthew Catavolo of Valour FC scored in sa国际传媒’s 3-0 Under-20 friendly victory over Costa Rica on Friday. Both players are in the sa国际传媒 acclimatization camp that runs through Friday in Costa Rica in preparation for the CONCACAF U-20 championship June 18 to July 3 in San Pedro Sula and Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
