They’re going to have to take the long way around.
And the first obstacle is Cavalry FC, an opponent as much a part of their history as their own fingerprints.
Forge FC lost for the first time at home since the CPL regular season began, letting what should have been a cherished 1-0 early lead slip away to a 2-1 loss to the high-octane Ottawa Atlético Sunday afternoon in the Championship semifinal, which pitted the top two regular-season finishers head-to-head. The Atléti advanced directly to the championship final in two weeks while the first-place Hammers get a repechage into the Contender Semifinal this Sunday (2 pm) against Cavalry FC, which lambasted York 4-1 in a quarter-final.
This will be the 38th head-to-head meeting in the six-plus seasons the Cavs and Hammers have been in existence. Forge holds a 15-10-11 margin, but Cavalry beat CPL Shield-winning Forge right in Hamilton in last year’s “A” semifinal, then beat them again in Calgary to win their first league playoff championship. It was also Calgary that ended Forge’s incredible 20-game undefeated streak with a 4-1 win in Alberta in late August.
The winner of Sunday’s game advances to meet Ottawa, and Forge would like an opportunity to repeat what they did in 2022: go into the Nation’s capital and snatch the title on the road.
"You have to give the props to Ottawa,” said Forge forward David Choinière who gave Forge a 1-0 lead in the 23rd minute, converting a sloppy bounce in the visitors' box after Dan Nimick’s alert run got the ball into scoring position.
“They played a good game, but we know that we’re better than what we showed today. That’s football. Sometimes it goes your way, sometimes it doesn’t, and you need to find ways to win. Today, we could not do that.
“I need more time to reflect on the game. But we’re not done yet. That’s the good part.”
It was Choinière’s 12th career goal in CPL post-season, Canadian Championship, and Concacaf play, and cemented his reputation as a money-game player. It also should have been the catalyst Forge needed. But a couple of sloppy passes and rare defensive inattentiveness led to goals by Gabriel Antinoro in the 33rd minute and another by league scoring leader Sam Salter in the 58th to send a small but vocal contingent of Ottawa travelling supporters into ecstasy. Antinoro, who also scored Ottawa’s goal in a 1-1 draw in September, sped down the field solo and drilled a scorcher past Hamilton keeper Jassem Koleilat.
Salter’s winner was really the work of veteran Manny Aparicio, who out-paced Forge defenders to keep a ball in at the baseline and got it to the dead-eyed Salter, whose 19 goals were an all-time CPL regular-season high. He was somehow left unmarked.
“We didn’t play our best, but I don’t think we played terribly either,” Koleilat said. “Playing a strong side like them, I don’t think they played their best as well. I don’t think overall it was a great game of football; they’ll be happier because they got the result. I think defensively, we weren’t up to our standard. I think on the ball, we definitely weren’t up to our standard.
“To sum it up, it was a frustrating day all around.”
Frustration exploded into anger near the end of added-on time as an apparent foul was not awarded when the pressing Forge—coolly repelled by an unpanicked three-centre-back defence—were convinced forward Nana Ampomah had been brought down just outside the Ottawa box. Instead, the Forge bench was hit with a red card.
“Nothing wrong was said, one of our coaches jumped up, crossed the line of the field. I get it,” head coach Bobby Smyrniotis said. “He immediately came back, and now you’ve got a red card. We sometimes give too many cards for hurting people’s feelings as opposed to challenges on the field. We have 45 iPads on the bench, so we saw what happened. We know it’s hard, but it’s tough to keep your emotions in check.”
Smyrniotis’s players would not be drawn into a discussion about officiating, but both teams had complained about missed calls during the game, and two seemingly obvious infractions in the Ottawa box had already planted a seed of anger and doubt in the Forge camp before the last-moment non-call.
It prompted Smyrniotis to appeal in front of the post-game media cameras for the CPL to try to find a way to finance and institute Video Assistant Referee (VAR), which reviews all such contentious calls and can overturn them.
“There were two (non-calls) there, and if there was VAR, there would be two penalty shots and maybe one of them goes in. One (foul) is with an arm in the air, the other brings a guy down in the box. Sometimes (VAR) would be nice to us, and some days it would go against us. Not my decision, not my money, not my infrastructure, but it takes out all of that, and for officials, it’s easier. It’s not easy to be an official in a match like today’s, but there have been crucial calls that are missed that are obvious. The reality is that there’s no way of reversing it; you need to be sharp in that moment, and when you’re not, you’ve got nothing else to help you. VAR has helped officiating across the world… It’s given that extra little buffer to make sure things are correct.
“Maybe once a year or every two years, I talk about officiating. It’s a tough job, but they also have to understand how tough our job is. There was a foul on Nana Ampomah today, outside the box. Not a penalty, a foul. In the 97th minute of a semifinal game. I always say that in our world, tomorrow I might not be here because of something that happens on the pitch that is maybe not in my control. Sometimes we can live in Disneyland and think the results don’t matter…they matter. Everything plays a role … but I’ll hold you to the same standards I hold my players.”
Smyrniotis did take time to credit Ottawa with playing well and taking advantage of mistakes, including a couple of rare-as-a-unicorn missed passes from captain Kyle Bekker.
“We had a good start to the game, we were calm in our block, we were patient,” said Bekker. “We had the opportunity and we took it and went up 1-0, which is everything you want in a game like this. And then I felt we were a little sloppy on the ball; we gave them too many chances and allowed the game to become more transitional than we would have liked. It was a bit uncharacteristic of a bunch of us, myself included. I wasn’t very clean on the ball today, and a bunch of the guys would say the same thing.”
Ottawa was satisfied with, and jubilant over, the win, which lifted them to just a victory away from a first league title, and knowing they’ll also have a huge home crowd behind them in the final.
“It feels a little better that it’s against them, because we know their quality, that they have been the best team in the history of the league,” Antinoro said. “To be able to beat them at their home is very special. But this year, we have a completely different team than last year. Some players stayed, but it’s a different model, a different type of playing, different confidence, different trust.”
Forge has the same kind of inner trust, and resilience after setbacks has always been part of their DNA. They’re going to need all of that against a confident Calgary squad on Sunday.
“And last time I checked, nobody has raised the trophy yet,” Smyrniotis said.