Valour FC comes up big

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This article was published 28/08/2022 (1454 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

In what was as close to a do-or-die situation as they’ve been in all year, Valour FC refused to blink.

Valour blanked the visiting Pacific FC 1-0 in a critical bout between two playoff hopefuls at IG Field on Sunday.

The win brings the Winnipeg club’s record to 8-6-7 (30 points) and tacks on three points to their bid for one of the four spots in the CPL playoffs. The six-point swing leaves Valour five points behind Pacific FC for the fourth seed and six back of Forge FC for the third seed with seven games left on the shrinking schedule.

The hosts were able to take advantage of a tired Pacific FC group that had been on the road for 12 days with stops in Jamaica and Costa Rica for the CONCACAF League and Halifax to play the Wanderers.

Valour also shed a monkey from their back, as the club had been winless in 13-straight matches against Pacific entering Sunday.

“We played a solid game without being perfect,” said head coach Phillip Dos Santos after the match. “The guys, it’s ‘congrats’ because they were challenged this week a lot with the work we did with them. And they responded very well. It looked like a team that understands where they are at this moment.”

“The team is resilient. This is a team that went a long spell without losing back-to-back games and it just happened once this year. I never question their integrity and the effort will never be questioned.”

After a relatively uneventful first half that saw both squads struggling to garner any significant chances, the urgency picked up in the second 45.

In the 60th minute, Valour forward Sean Rea sprung leading scorer Moses Dyer with a pass into the visitor’s box. Dyer unleashed a hard shot from the top-right of the penalty area, but Pacific keeper Callum Irving steered aside the best chance of the match to that point, forcing a corner.

On the ensuing kick, Rea curved his corner into a mass of waiting bodies, where Rocco Romeo eventually blasted the ball into the back of the visitor’s net for his second goal of the season, bringing the Valour faithful to their feet.

“Me and Sean Rea, I just tell him where to put the ball,” Romeo said after the game. “In my Valour career, he’s assisted most of my goals … He put the ball in that area, there was just a lot of movement happening and it was ‘who’s going to react first.’ I tried to smash it into the net and then once I did that, I could just see relief from a lot of the guys.”

The lone marker ended up being enough as Valour continued to show why they’re one of the stingiest clubs in their own end this season, preventing Pacific from recording a shot on target in the match.

Valour has now allowed just 24 goals in 21 matches this season, the third-fewest in the CPL. Rayane Yesli made his fifth-consecutive start in goal for the club and recorded his third clean sheet of the season.

“I think we did a good job closing them down,” Dos Santos said. “Credit to the guys … it’s the sum of the parts. You need everyone to play their game and be at their level in order to have a complete performance from a backline.”

The significance of Sunday’s victory was evident on the pitch. Following the final whistle, several Valour players collapsed to the turf with their arms in the air, a sign of relief that they had lived to fight another day.

Valour (8-6-7) will keep the homestand rolling on Wednesday against third-place Forge FC (11-3-6), in what is yet another game with their backs against the wall.

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.

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