Forging a big shadow on Canadian soccer
Smyrniotis has two Canadian Premier League championships in its only two years of competition, and that’s just part of his influence
Under head coach Bobby Smyrniotis, Forge FC has been the class of the Canadian Premier League.
The two-time soccer champions from Hamilton look to make their international mark as they open 2020 CONCACAF League play today in El Salvador against CD Municipal Limeno. They played two rounds in the 2019 league, defeating Antigua of Guatemala and winning the opening game against the Honduran powerhouse before losing 4-2 on aggregate.
While the CPL is new to the scene, success for Smyrniotis has been more than two decades in the making. And he, along with older brother Costa, has played a key role developing and nurturing Canadian soccer talent since founding Sigma FC in 2005 in Mississauga.
“It starts with a dream. And now we’re here,” said the 44-year-old Costa Smyrniotis, Forge’s director of football.
Toronto FC’s Richie Laryea, considered one of the top outside backs in Major League Soccer, joined Sigma at age 11. He counts Bobby Smyrniotis as a key figure in his development. Fittingly, the two will face each other when Forge FC meets TFC for the 2020 Canadian championship, probably in December.
“Growing up he was one of, I would say, very few coaches that actually knew what they were doing. … He was teaching me things I never even dreamt or thought about,” said Laryea, who at 25 still keeps in touch with Smyrniotis. “He definitely took my game to a whole new level and it was really important for me to have him in my development that early in my career.”
Veteran Forge defender David Edgar, whose soccer resumé includes stints at Newcastle, Burnley, Birmingham City and Sheffield United, says Smyrniotis is world-class.
“I’ve worked with coaches all around the world and Bobby’s right up there in terms of tactical knowledge and the tactical knowledge that I’ve gained from him personally has been fantastic,” said Edgar.
Forge captain Kyle Bekker, another Sigma product, says Smyrniotis, 41, is professional and prepared.
“He’s very demanding in how he wants us to play and how he wants us to show up every single day. He just wants to create that environment where we can be as professional and successful as possible.”
Born and bred in Toronto, Smyrniotis grew up in a soccer house. His father, an immigrant from Greece, worked long hours at his steakhouse but loved the game and passed that on to Bobby and Costa.
Bobby played for the East York Soccer Club and then Vaughan Soccer Club.
“Little brother got all the talent … He got pretty good pretty quick,” said Costa Smyrniotis.
“You saw it from a young age. The talent was there but you saw a field general from a young age,” he added.
Carrying ambitions of a pro career, Bobby Smyrniotis headed to Greece at 16 to go on trial with different clubs.
“I was a very good student and decided maybe the best path is to come back and try out a scholarship.”
He started at York University before transferring to the College of Charleston in South Carolina on scholarship. A central midfielder, he had talent but also wonky knees.
At 22, he moved back to Greece to work on a master’s degree in sports management through the University of Louisville.
His life took a turn when one of his classmates, who worked in marketing at famed Greek club Olympiakos, offered to set him up for an interview with the club’s youth department.
Smyrniotis, who had already done some coaching with Vaughan, ended up joining the club as an intern. A few months later, the 23-year-old Smyrniotis had a job.
Olympiakos’s youth academy technical director took a liking to him. Smyrniotis spent the next two years learning at the late Sakis Dokas’s side.
“I said I was doing two master’s degrees at once,” Bobby said. “He was my first footballing father and really taught me the right way of how to work in youth football. It was just excellent.”
Dokas told him not to use a whistle, saying it was for animals. “Communicate with the kids, talk to them, let them learn your voice,” was the advice.
“So that was the last day I ever used a whistle on the soccer field,” said Smyrniotis.
His life took another turn, thanks to an agent he met who was planning a series of camps in Greece with the technical staff from Ajax of Amsterdam. He asked Smyrniotis to help.
He spent a month running the camps, developing ties with the people behind Ajax’s famed youth system.
In 2005, he moved back to Canada. But the connection to Ajax continued when the Dutch club decided he could help them launch camps in Canada.
Smyrniotis wanted to put what he had learned into his own club situation.
“Because I believed we had players. I just believed we didn’t have the structure or the culture in organizations.”
He turned to Costa, who was working as a financial analyst on Bay Street.
“I said ‘ We need to start something. There’s good talent here.’ ... That’s how we got started with Sigma in 2005, through some summer camps and then slowly training programs and them finally into teams.”
It wasn’t easy. Setting up Sigma took time and everything they had. “The one thing I always said. We’re going to do this, we’re going to dream big,” said Smyrniotis.
Added Costa: “We said at the time ‘You take care of the inside the lines and I’ll take care of everything outside of the lines.’ It was a good fit.”
Sigma’s full academy started in 2007, the same time as Toronto FC.
Since getting players to Europe was difficult, they looked to college soccer as a playing opportunity, seeing it as “the best reserve-level football at the time in North America.”
Players like Laryea, Cyle Larin, Kwame Awuah and Chris Nanco, who started with Sigma at 10 or 11, were recruited by U.S. colleges after learning their trade under Smyrniotis.
Today, he estimates 14 of his Forge players came through the Sigma ranks.