A massive Canadian Premier League six-pointer is on deck this weekend in Langley, as Vancouver FC hosts Valour FC at Willoughby Community Park on Friday.
The third meeting of the year for these two teams, both know what’s at stake in this match - it’s a chance to turn the corner after a tough start to the 2025 CPL regular season.
Now, both into the second half of their respective campaigns, neither will want to stay where they’ve found themselves at this stage, as both sit tied for last place with just eight points.
Valour holds a slight edge in the table due to their wins and the fact that they have a game-in-hand over Vancouver, but the reality is that both teams sit 13 points behind York United for the fifth and final playoff spot, a gap that seems to grow each week, something they’d love to both change.
When looking at the hosts, Vancouver certainly recognizes the gravity of their situation, sitting with just one win in 15 CPL matches, as they parted ways with manager Afshin Ghotbi this week, bringing in former York United manager Martin Nash on an interim basis.
A team that continues to bolster their squad, bringing in three new signings this week, they’re hoping Nash can come and spark a team that has the potential for much more, as they’ve shown during their surprise run to the Canadian Championship semi-finals this summer.
Nash will have his work cut out for him, as he inherits a team that has scored just 14 goals and conceded 30 in 15 games, but his arrival could spark the team to find the consistency that has continued to elude them this season, so look for him to hit the ground running with his new side.
“We want the team to be aggressive when we lose the ball, we want to try and win it back as fast as we can, and try to put our stamp on games; we don't want to let teams take it to us,” Nash said when asked what he wants to see from his team. “Let's try to take it to other teams.”
“That's gonna take time, it's not gonna happen overnight, but it's something we're gonna work towards and try to improve the players and the team as we move forward.”
Meanwhile, for Valour, they’re also looking for a similar jolt, as they try to reignite their campaign.
Much like Vancouver, however, the story of their campaign has been their inconsistency, which is why they’ve scored just 13 goals and conceded 34, with a large chunk of those goals conceded coming at the beginning and end of the second half.
Because of that, head coach Philip Dos Santos has tried to experiment with his lineup in recent weeks, and while the performances have remained solid, showing the potential they have to achieve much more with their current group, they continue to chase that perfect mix.
“That's the most difficult thing in football, it’s these micro moments that are making us go from winning a match or drawing, and instead losing,” Dos Santos said of his team’s run as of late. “There are moments in games that you cannot replicate in training, so you have to keep working with the guys and find a balance between holding them accountable and being positive with them.”
In terms of player availability, Valour will be without captain Raphael Ohin due to yellow card accumulation, while attackers Kian Williams and Jordan Faria are battling knocks and look to be unavailable, although that could open the door for the debut of the recently-acquired Markiyan Voytsekhovskyy. As for Vancouver, they’ll be without Nicolás Mezquida as he serves the second of a two-game suspension, while Emrick Fotsing will remain out, but there’s no word on the status of the rest of their players, including a trio of new signings made this week in Hugo Mbongue, Michel Cavalcante and Abdoulaye Outtara.
3 THINGS TO WATCH
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The importance of not getting caught up in the occasion: There’s no doubt that a match like this carries extra weight for those involved, as is often the case for important six-point battles of any sort. Not only do teams want to improve their playoff hopes, but no one wants to stay stuck at the bottom of the table, either, so they’ll see this match as an immediate opportunity to begin shifting their fortunes. At the same time, the trap can be to get too caught up in the emotions of such a match, as at the end of the day, it’s just another game. Of course, that’s easier said than done, but finding the right approach to this one will be key. The team that can be patient, not get caught up in early emotions and convert their opportunities will triumph, but the margins can be so fine when executing such a plan. What will be most interesting to see, however, is how both teams approach this game. Given their struggling defensive records, might both teams opt for more of a cautious and defensive posture to try and avoid a high-scoring game, having combined for eight goals in their first two meetings of 2025 (in which they traded 3-1 wins)?. When seeing that there were also four combined red cards across those matches, that seems to be a likely outcome, as emotions got the best of each team on different occasions, so look for both to try and employ more of a pragmatic approach. That doesn’t mean fireworks aren’t possible - but it’s hard to imagine both teams coming out flying in the first 10 minutes, for example, with the fireworks likely to be saved for the end of the match, depending on how things progress.
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What changes might we see from Vancouver? Whenever a team shakes up their coaching situation, there’s always a big question to be answered - what will change? For some managers, stability is the name of the game, but others might prefer to throw their own stamp on things. In Nash’s case, it’s expected that he opts for more of the former, given that his system at York United wasn’t all too dissimilar from what Vancouver was employing, at least in terms of formations and base philosophies, but that doesn’t mean that he won’t change anything, either. He admitted as much in his pre-match availability, noting that he wants his side to press and defend more aggressively, and flood the opposing box with more numbers, two things he felt this side could do better in the matches he’d watched. Given the short runway he’s had leading into this game, he’ll really start to put his stamp on the team over the next few weeks, but this first match will be a good chance for him to set a baseline for his team to follow. It’s not an easy match to be dropped into, as he gets thrust right into a crucial six-pointer, but that also shows why he was prioritized as an interim manager, with his familiarity with CPL being a huge asset in this case. Instead of having to learn about the intricacies of the league on the fly, his main focus can be on figuring out how to get the most out of his group and get accustomed to working with his new team, which is a big plus as it’s allowed him to immediately get to work in terms of implementing his system.
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Can Valour avoid conceding second-half goals? What will frustrate Valour most about their loss to Cavalry in their last match won’t be that they lost, or their performance, but when they lost, as they fell 2-1 after a late stoppage time goal from Sergio Camargo. With that, they spoiled what was overall a pretty good showing, one where they’ll have felt a draw was a just reward, with a win also not far off what they also felt they deserved. Yet, that’s been the story of Valour’s season, as they’ve struggled to keep opponents off the board in the late stages of the game. Combined with their sluggish starts to the second half, which has also seen them concede an disproportionate number of goals at that stage, and that’s helped explain some of their defensive struggles. Just look at their recent run, which has seen them lose five straight in CPL play - in each of those matches, they’ve either conceded in the first 10 minutes of the second half or the last 15 minutes. Along with a couple of goals that have come right before half time, it shows that the goal for Valour in this game won’t necessarily to be solid defensively (that goes without saying), but to instead be solid at the right times, such as at the 10 minutes before and after half time, and at the end of the match. While there’s no such thing as a good goal to concede, there are certainly bad ones, as not all conceded goals are created equal, and Valour seems to be conceding a lot of ones they’d want to typically avoid, leading to this slump.
PROJECTED STARTING XIs
Vancouver FC: Irving; Dada-Luke, Campagna, O'Connor, Gee; Fry, Norman Jr.; Godbout, Batista, Bah; Ndiaye
Valour FC: Viscosi; Fernandez, Facchineri, Egwu, Alarcón; Figueiredo, Mlah; Twardek, Froese, Antonoglou; Morgan
ALL-TIME SERIES
Vancouver FC wins: 4 || Valour FC wins: 3 || Draws: 3
Last meeting:
June 4, 2025 — Valour FC 3-1 Vancouver FC
KEY QUOTES
“It'll take time. I think with this week being so short, I can't expect things to turn around overnight, and I don't think anyone can, but I believe in this squad and the group of players that are here, and that was a big part of the reason I joined the club. I just want the players to go play with energy, to try and put their stamp on the game and see what happens at the end. I think it's about the process for us, not about worrying about the result - let’s go out and try to implement some things and grow as a group as we move forward.” – Vancouver FC interim head coach Martin Nash
“I think it has to serve as a wake-up call for everybody. We've been pushing things along and trying to continue the narrative that our performances have been there, but our results haven't. That’s gotten us to the point where the manager has been let go and we're signing guys midseason, so we're up against the wall, and we need to start putting three points on the board to crawl our way back into that playoff picture. When you add fresh faces into training, with new guys running things and just changing things up, that always helps when you're in a slump. It's been good, guys have been responding well.” – Vancouver FC goalkeeper Callum Irving
“The next game is the most important. It’s as simple as that, the guys know that we can't look too far ahead, the mountain is a tall one to climb. We need to think about it and see it as being the next game and not fall into the trap of what type of opposition it is, where it puts you in the standings. We just have to go and play this game with the idea that it’s our next game, as the next one is always the most important.” – Valour FC head coach Philip Dos Santos
“At the end of the day, football comes in waves. Sometimes teams have difficulties in form, but you just keep plugging away, keep doing the simple things correctly, and then after a while, things tend to straighten out. We hope that through our continuous effort that we can turn this around.” – Valour FC attacker Kianz Froese
