Toronto FC Re-Development Showing Results
Dennis Fitter
Senior Staff Writer
InsideSoccer Magazine
freelances at dennis.fitter@gmail.com
Toronto FC go into break still looking for ways to improve
TFC appears to be moving into the next stage of its re-development program as the team takes the MLS World Cup break riding a five game undefeated streak. Coach Preki’s evangelism has preached the virtues of hard work and unity his players and anyone else who follows this team can repeat without thinking twice. After a slow, shaky start to 2010, the Reds sit in better shape than ever before a third of the way into the season.
Now it is the more subtle influences of the new man’s well practiced coaching style showing results.
Empty Highlight Reel
Dennis Fitter
Senior Staff Writer
InsideSoccer Magazine
freelances at dennis.fitter@gmail.com
Vancouver hopes cut but still alive after scoreless draw with Toronto in Voyageurs Cup play
If you had to put a highlight reel together on first half action in last night’s Voyageurs Cup match in Vancouver, you would be hard pressed to come up with something. Toronto FC exhibited a road weary look from the grind of a busy game and travel schedule, while the Whitecaps just appeared hapless. Add to that a paltry crowd due to some dangerously inclement pregame weather moving through the Vancouver area and you get the idea of the mood.
An uninspired effort is often the case in competitions like these that strain fixture dates to the limit.
But there was lots on the line in this one. Vancouver needing at least a draw to keep their hopes going, showed the first signs of coming alive after the break.
In the 56th minute a well placed 35 yard free kick by the Caps midfield general Ricardo Sanchez created some Toronto scrambling to defend. It also alerted the Reds to remember they were here to reduce Vancouver chances to the minimum.
By the 62nd minute mark, Toronto had made all three of their changes, bringing in Nick Garcia for a tired Nana Attakora at the back, Chad Barrett for O’Brien White to ignite an offensive threat and Martin Saric in the mid for Gabe Gala.
Still, the Whitecaps carried most of the play, though little in the way of a dangerous assault on goal. Toronto tried to keep pace, but few efforts were capable of carrying through. It wasn’t until 83 minutes that TFC got their first crack at goal. A hard shot by tireless captain Dwayne De Rosario caused keeper Nolly to come up big to keep his team’s Nutrilite Canadian Championship series hopes alive. Even that effort did not prove enough incentive for the visitors to try finishing it all.
It was the Whitecaps who came up with repeated effort to work the flanks and create chances that wound up little more than a series of Martin Nash taken corners coming to nothing.
Vancouver did not get the result they were after, but the tournament is still alive. Barely.. Should the Whitecaps get by the Impact next Wednesday in Montreal they will still have to beat TFC on their home turf in the final Nutrilite match June 2.
Toronto heads home satisfied they turned in their best away effort in memory, gaining a win in Montreal, a scoreless draw against MLS league leading LA Galaxy, and a tightening of the screws on Vancouver’s plans to lift the Voyageurs Cup.
SAAC Gains OSA Approval
Dennis Fitter
Dennis Fitter is a freelance journalist.
You can reach him at dennis.fitter@gmail.com
Soccer Academy Alliance Canada gets OSA approval
After several years of unsuccessfully applying to the Ontario Soccer Association for official recognition, SAAC, a national association of privately owned, soccer skills teaching schools or academies, has been voted into the fold.
SAAC is now an Associate Member of the OSA. In a vote of the Board the OSA passed RFD 2010-007, a referendum tabled earlier this year to give Associate Membership to the Soccer Academy Alliance of Canada.
“This is a big step towards legitimizing to the professional academy system in Canada and helping SAAC achieve it’s vision of becoming the primary player development platform in Canada.”
Lino Terra Commissioner of the SAAC
Throughout the world, the academy system has been the standard bearer of quality coaching and elite player development. For reasons unclear or perhaps untold, officialdom in the soccer community has resisted their incorporation into the mainstream. And, that has hindered the realization of our soccer playing youth’s full potential. Until today. At least in Ontario.
“Today’s OSA approval for SAAC Associate membership means that the real work is just about to start. The academies will be entering a new phase in Canadian Soccer with the objective of building a solid foundation for player and coach development. I challenge the Canadian soccer society to join the academies alliance – SAAC – in achieving its mission to develop World Class soccer players in Canada on a continual and
systematic basis, by providing our members with best-in-class training, facilities and competition.”Bassam Naim ANB Academy Director
Let Us Face This One Straight On
Dennis Fitter
Dennis Fitter is a freelance journalist.
You can reach him at dennis.fitter@gmail.com
Where are we hiding the coaches to develop our players?
Putting soccer stories together is a satisfying way to meet lots of super people doing great things in our sport. Their thoughts and opinion come zinging in from all different directions. What a trigger many have been to dig deeper and find out more about the broader impact of what they have to say.
Whether we as journalists admit it or not, how we think and the way we put the things we write is molded and re-shaped by the people we get to meet. Some of the favorite themes of journalists are just a compilation of what we hear. Honestly, very little is original thinking.
Paul James, the football player turned soccer coach, turned soccer writer told me on more than a couple of occasions of the impossible task he had coaching Canada’s under 20’s to a respectable showing in the 2001 world championship. Sometimes as if it were a weight around his neck and on others as if revealing the secret to future success, James remains bothered by the lack of urgency in our development program moving forward.
