As the Valour FC players stepped into a soggy Starlight Stadium this week, head coach Phillip Dos Santos shouted to his charges: “Get your legs moving because this training needs to be good. We’re here now. Let’s make these 10 days count.”
Make it count is exactly what Valour FC did Tuesday in a 4-0 Canadian Premier League pre-season victory over York United at Starlight Stadium.
Both clubs, the former based in Winnipeg and the latter in the Greater Toronto Area, are on the Island for their CPL training camps.
York United, under new head coach and 39-time sa国际传媒 capped Victoria-product Martin Nash, opened camp in Vancouver last week with a 4-3 shootout victory at UBC against Vancouver Whitecaps 2 of Major League Soccer Next Pro. It’s old-home week for Nash, the St. Michaels University School graduate and former Blue Jags basketball and soccer star, who played pro for the Whitecaps.
Defending CPL-champion Pacific FC will play Nash’s York United in a friendly on Friday afternoon at 1 p.m. and Valour FC in a friendly match March 24, both at Starlight Stadium.
Island-based PFC began the preseason competition with a 1-0 victory over the University of Victoria Vikes on Friday night at Centennial Stadium. It didn’t take long for PFC prize loan player Kamron Habibullah to make an impact as he scored the game’s lone goal. PFC is hoping there’s a lot more like that coming from the touted teenager, who made his MLS debut last season at age 17 with the Whitecaps, and who starred for sa国际传媒 in the 2019 U-17 FIFA World Cup in Brazil.
The friendly against the Vikes was especially meaningful for PFC defender Rees Goertzen, the Mount Douglas Secondary graduate, selected in the second round out of the UVic Vikes in the 2022 CPL U Sports draft held in January.
Holders Pacific FC will open the CPL regular season April 10 at Starlight Stadium against 2019- and 2020-champion Forge FC of Hamilton.
