Valour coming on strong in hunt for playoff spot

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This article was published 13/09/2022 (1447 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It’s crunch time for Valour FC.

The pro soccer club is in a battle for the franchise’s first playoff berth since joining the Canadian Premier League (CPL) four seasons ago.

The Winnipeg squad and Pacific FC (Victoria) are tied with 36 points and share the fourth and final playoff spot. Valour had just four games left on the slate, however, while Pacific (10-6-7) has five.

Valour (10-6-8) plays its last home game of the regular season Sunday when Atlético Ottawa (11-8-5) visits IG Field. Game time is 3 p.m.

It wasn’t long ago Valour was lagging behind the contenders in the playoff race. Then August hit and the team went on a 5-1-1 run to vault into the thick of the action.

This past Sunday, the Valour crew stumbled against the lowly HFX Wanderers, who have been a pain in Valour’s side over the past four years. Valour has never won in Halifax and that trend continued with a 1-0 loss. It was the second defeat to the Wanderers in the last four weeks in the Maritimes.

“I don’t know. I’ll give them this much: the stadium, it’s not an easy place to play at,” said captain Andrew Jean-Baptiste about the club’s struggles when playing at Wanderers Grounds. “I refer to that stadium as the Anfield (Liverpool’s stadium) of the CPL.

“It was devastating, you know? Two games, two penalties, two losses. And that defines our history in Halifax this season. And it hurts because I think the second time we went back out there we had a better game plan… but we just got to look forward and move on.”

Indeed, moving on will be critical this week, as coach Phillip Dos Santos’ club prepares to host Atlético Ottawa, which rests atop the CPL standings with 41 points.

The teams are 1-1-1 in three meetings this season, but Valour can keep up with the defensively sound squad. It beat Atlético 6-1 in the third game of the season and has been equally as stout in its own end all season.

“I think we need to look at the teams ahead of us and not the ones that are below us,” Dos Santos said. “Yes, I would be lying if I said I wasn’t looking at the Atlético and Pacific game (last weekend), but for us, we need to aim for bigger and that starts on the weekend, where we know that if we’d win the game, we would be two points behind a team that’s currently in first, so it’s a big game for us.”

A big game in a big spot is nothing out of the ordinary for Valour since Dos Santos took over as bench boss midway through last season. The club scrapped through the second half of the 2021 schedule and had a chance to make the playoffs with a win over FC Edmonton in the last match of the season.

Valour drew 3-3 after an admirable comeback in the second half.

The team is in a similar spot with four games remaining.

“I think we have to. We have to learn from the moments where you’re so close from the line like that,” Dos Santos said. “The difference this time is we’re actually above the line. A lot of the guys were here last year and there’s windows of opportunities and this is one that we need to take.”

“We’re good. We’re feeling good about ourselves. Ask me the same question after the weekend and maybe my answer’s gonna change, but right now, we’re feeling good about ourselves.”

One key decision Dos Santos will have to make ahead of Sunday’s match is in goal. Valour has a pair of red-hot keepers in Canadians Jonathan Sirois and Rayane Yesli.

Sirois, the veteran of the two stoppers who was also named the CPL’s goalkeeper of the year in 2021, started the campaign as the clear-cut starter but has slowly regressed into a shared role with the rookie.

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After starting in 17 of the first 18 matches of the season — demonstrating he’s one of the best keepers in the league — Sirois surprisingly rode pine for six consecutive outings while Yesli shone, recording four clean sheets.

“That was for sure a hard time for me,” said Sirois. “But at the same time, Rayane was doing well, the team was doing well, too, so it was just a matter of time and I just had to keep my head down, keep working and wait for my turn to come.

“I think it’s just part of being a professional athlete. Me and Rayane, I think all year we’ve had a healthy competition. We’re both doing really well in training and really well in games. I think the frustrating part is probably when you think you should be maybe playing more. Or you want to be playing more but you’re not, but you also gotta understand that sometimes the coach makes decisions for different reasons and you just have to live with it and wait for your opportunity. And when it comes around, you just have to seize it.”

jfreysam@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @jfreysam

Joshua Frey-Sam
Reporter

Josh Frey-Sam reports on sports and business at the Free Press. Josh got his start at the paper in 2022, just weeks after graduating from the Creative Communications program at Red River College. He reports primarily on amateur teams and athletes in sports. Read more about Josh.

Every piece of reporting Josh produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press‘s tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press’s history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.