FC Edmonton back in action with loss
CPL tournament gets underway at Charlottetown, writes Derek Van Diest.
It had been more than 300 days since FC Edmonton last played a game, but the team picked up pretty much where it left off in October.
Despite playing well and generating a number of good scoring chances, FC Edmonton came up short in a 2-0 loss on Sunday against Forge FC at the Canadian Premier League Island Games tournament in Charlottetown, P.E.I.
Forge FC defender Kwame Awuah scored on a fantastic strike to give the defending
CPL champions the lead in the 11th minute and FC Edmonton defender Kareem Moses scored an own goal two minutes into second-half injury time to put the game out of reach.
“This was our first game, so up until this point we’ve won a couple of Canadian championships playing intrasquad games against each other, but you never really know where you’re at until you play opposition,” FC Edmonton head coach Jeff Paulus said. “And, of course, we have the best team in the league in our first game.
“I’m delighted; we had a game plan set up and I thought our lads executed that quite well, and I don’t think Forge, especially in the first 60 minutes, created anything against us in the run of play.”
FC Edmonton also may have lost centre-back Amer Didic, who was helped off the field in the 59th minute with an apparent right-ankle injury. Didic rolled his ankle making a challenge at the top of his own penalty area. All the games in the tournament are being played at the UPEI Artificial Turf Field.
“It’s an unfortunate one and
I’ll have to watch the replay to get my thoughts on it,” Paulus said. “But we’ll see. I don’t have an update right now, we’ll assess him over the next 24 hours, it does look like a sore one, for sure, and we’ll see. But it looks like a bad one.”
FC Edmonton started off well considering it was the team’s first game since Oct. 19, 2019. They dictated play until Awuah had the ball bounce to him 25 yards out from the net and curled a left-footed shot up and over goalkeeper Connor James to give Forge FC a 1-0 lead.
Edmonton came close to tying the game in the 39th minute when Didic moved up on a free kick and was able to get to the end of a ball crossed into the box, but his header bounced off of the goalpost. Later in the half, FC Edmonton midfielder Hanson Boakai had the ball roll to him in front of the net, but he was not able to get enough on his shot to trouble Forge FC goalkeeper Triston Henry.
Midfielder Keven Aleman, making his debut for FC Edmonton, also created problems for Forge FC on a couple of occasions.
“I expected us to be really difficult to break down (Sunday),” Paulus said. “I really feel that we’ve got a very strong defensive unit and then some of the forwards that we have and the midfielders, I’m delighted, I was hoping we get a result. We were playing the defending champions and you don’t know what you’re going to see, but after that first half, I did believe we would get a result whether it was one point (tie) or three (win), because I thought we kept the game fairly under control.”
In the second half, Forge FC began dictating play, particularly after Didic was helped off the field. Forge were playing their second game of the tournament, tying Cavalry FC of Calgary 2-2 in the tournament opener on Thursday.
“Everyone, to be honest, was feeling good and feeling fresh,” Forge FC head coach Bobby Smyrniotis said. “That was something we were happy to see with the team. We had a plan going in for these first two games on how we wanted to use the squad and how we wanted to rotate through (players) and we’re very happy with the points total at this point.”
Forge FC dominated possession in the second half, finishing with 63 per cent of the ball, but FC Edmonton came close to tying the game as Moses got to the end of a cross on a free kick. His header hit the crossbar.
Deep into second-half injury time, Forge FC was awarded a free kick to the left of the FC Edmonton net. Midfielder Maxim Tissot whipped in a cross into the penalty area and, in an effort to cut it out, Moses had it go off his head past James at the far post.