Final Score: Atlético Ottawa 1-2 York United
Goalscorers: Didić 69′; Wright 36′, 49′
Game of the 2024 season: 37
CPL match: 521

Match in a minute or less

York United snapped Atlético Ottawa’s nine-game undefeated run in CPL play on Saturday, as they defeated their rivals 2-1 on the road at TD Place, giving them their first win under new manager Benjamín Mora.

York opened the scoring in the 36th minute, as Austin Ricci found Brian Wright with a nice ball into the box on a counter-attack, and Wright did the rest from there, chipping the ball over Ottawa’s Nathan Ingham to make it 1-0.

Then, they added to their lead in the 49th minute, as Wright found the net with a powerful strike after a perfect pass into the box from Max Ferrari, completing his brace to make it 2-0.

Ottawa then made things interesting in the 69th minute, however. There, Matteo de Brienne launched a dangerous long throw into the box, and after the ball fell to Amer Didić, the Ottawa centre-back managed to slot the ball home to make it 2-1 with 20 minutes to go.

From there, however, York would do enough to win in the end, allowing Mora to celebrate his first victory with his new club.

Three Observations

York’s work off the ball crucial as they hand Ottawa first loss of 2024 CPL season

Sometimes, it’s important to be able to be comfortable without the ball. Naturally, it’s important to want to hold onto the ball and be a team that possesses it, but the reality is that there are always going to be games where one will have less of the ball than hoped.

Because of that, it makes it important that teams are organized when they have to play without it, and most importantly, that they’re okay if they’re made to suffer without it.

York showed why that was important to start the game, as Ottawa immediately put them to work defensively. Holding 60.7 per cent of possession, Ottawa immediately looked to break York down, as they tried to stretch the pitch and create numerical superiorities both centrally and out wide. Employing a 3-4-3 of sorts in possession, they put a lot of emphasis on pushing the ball wide and having their wingers stretch play, but they also had the ability to flood the midfield.

Yet, that didn’t bother York, who employed a 5-3-2 out of possession, which allowed them to match Ottawa’s width while still remaining in midfield. In particular, their strong-side midfielder in the middle three often stepped up to help them press in a 5-2-3, while the weak-side wing back sometimes pushed forward to make it a 4-4-2, both of which ensured they didn’t sit too narrow and open up the wide areas for Ottawa to drive forward into.

Because of that, while York didn’t have much of the ball to start the game, they still looked comfortable defensively, keeping Ottawa to just 0.29 xG on six shots in the first half.

Then, as Ottawa started to ramp up the pressure in the second half once York when up by two, York didn’t waver in their defensive concentration, as they held Ottawa to just 0.66 xG despite giving up 15 shots and letting Ottawa hold 66.1% possession, as not many of them ended up being of high quality.

As a result, it paved the way for a crucial York victory, as they were ruthless when they had their chances, making sure their defensive work ended up being worth it in the end.

That’s a credit to the effort they put in as a team, yet it shows how quickly they’ve been able to implement the ideas of their new manager, who mentioned after the game that he wants his team to be strong in all phases of the game going forward.

Especially defensively, an area where they’ve struggled at times before, as they showed in 2023 when they conceded the second-most goals in the league, that’s why he’s made it a big area of emphasis to begin his tenure.

“Some teams just are attacking teams, so when they don’t have the ball, they don’t know how to work as a collective,” Mora explained. “They don’t know how to work as a compact block, to limit the distance between players in their coverage and to know the help that we need when we don’t have the ball.”

“Our team today knew when to attack in transition, knew when to keep possession of the ball, knew when to make overloads in the middle, knew when to make runs.”

“We need to be balanced, and we need to know that at some points in games, we’re not going to have the ball and we’re going to have to defend, and that’s what we did today.”

When seeing a performance like this, so far so good, and York will now look to build on it as they aim to push up the table in the weeks to come.

“Throughout the week, we talked about these things and executing our tactics,” Wright explained. “We know that ideally, we would love to keep the ball for 90 minutes, but that’s unrealistic, so in certain moments of the game, you’re going to have to suffer, but how long can you withstand that suffering and then get the ball back and then get back in control of the game (is key).”

Ottawa lacks efficiency in front of goal in defeat

When it comes to the attack, quality over quantity is often the ideal when forced to pick between the two, although most certainly wouldn’t complain about having an abundance of both.

Unfortunately for Ottawa, however, quality chances evaded them in this game despite an abundance of quantity, as they were unable to make the most of their many chances inside of the box.

Despite finishing with 63% of possession, 21 shots (including nine on target), 11 shots in the box and a whopping 43 touches in York’s box (by comparison, York just had seven), Ottawa created just one big chance and a total of 0.95 xG (an average of 0.04 xG per shot).

Therefore, while they certainly had chances, they were going to require spectacular finishing to make the most of them, and Ottawa were just unable to find enough of that in the end. Part of that also came down to a spectacular performance from York’s goalkeeper, Thomas Vincensini, who made eight saves, but Ottawa will know that they could’ve made him work more than they did.

Yet, they just lacked the ruthlessness they’ve had in the box in prior games, as their decision-making was a step slower than usual. The best example of that may have come on a few separate occasions in the first 60 minutes – there, after some dangerous cutbacks from Ottawa’s wide players, there were three different times where Ollie Bassett could’ve been found with a flick or a dummy, but those actions didn’t come.

It may seem like a small thing, but as Ottawa has navigated their strong start to the year, a big part of what’s worked for them has been their fluidity in possession and their sharp decision-making in the box, both of which they lacked in this game.

Against a team as disciplined defensively as York ended up being, that made it tough for them to find the chances they needed to break the game open, allowing York to grind out a result.

“The only thing that we lacked was our last detail.” Ottawa’s head coach, Carlos González said afterwards. “At the end of the day, that’s the most important thing –  putting the ball in the back of the net. They did their job, we did ours pretty good, too, but we should’ve scored.”

At the same time, it provided another key learning lesson for this Ottawa side – the importance of maintaining their performances. When a team is winning, it can sometimes create an air of invincibility around a team, as they can start to believe that they can win without needing to play their best. That can lead to the creation of bad habits, which can show up in a loss, and then make it hard to get back on a streak.

Therefore, for Ottawa, the big thing will be to be to use this as a sign of the work that still lies ahead. Thanks to their strong start, they’ve put themselves in a good position to make the playoffs and push for a regular season title, but with 18 games still remaining, they’ve still got a lot of work to make those two things happen.

“We’ve been trying to find internal motivation every single day, and now we have a reason externally,” González said. “We’ve lost, so we have to bounce back, and in a certain way this is good and positive for the team, we cannot feel that we are invincible, we cannot feel that we can’t play our best and win, and we have to feel that every game is going to be tough in this league so we have to be prepared for that.”

The biggest challenge that teams at the top of the table face is that opponents tend to bring their A-game to try and stop them, eager to send a message to the rest of their league. York certainly showed that in this game, for example, giving them a win that they can build off of as they find their feet under their new manager.

Now, Ottawa will make sure not to dwell on this one too much, as their performance was arguably better than what they’ve showed in some recent wins, but they’ll also know that it’s a sign of the challenge they face if they’re to maintain their hot start.

“Carlos (González) had this great quote after we won our first match in 2022 that he put up on the projector, and it said “Victory hides what defeats show,” Ottawa’s goalkeeper, Nathan Ingham, said after the match. “And that’s the reality when you’re winning and getting draws, you can do things wrong, but if you end up with three points, everyone’s happy, but then when things go wrong, all of a sudden, people start pointing fingers.”

“I think this group’s done a really good job of just keeping a baseline, and treating every game the same way, and statistically, realistically everyone drops points during the year, so what we’ve tried to do is show up with the same mentality, work rate every day to give ourselves the best chance of winning each game.”

Brian Wright doesn’t miss a beat for York in return from injury

As of writing, there is now a new leader in the CPL’s Golden Boot race: York United’s Brian Wright, who with his brace in this game, finished the game as the sole name atop the CPL’s top scorer chart with six goals.

Along with three assists, which gives him a league-leading nine goal contributions, it’s been a strong start to the year for York’s striker, who has already blown away his numbers from his first season with York in 2023, where he scored just two goals and added two assists across 27 appearances in regular season and playoff play.

In fact, he’s already matched his best season in terms of goal contributions in the CPL, which came in 2022 when he had seven goals and two assists for Atlético Ottawa, and he’s now one goal from matching his best single-season tally in the league, which also came in that same campaign.

Plus, that’s made even more remarkable by the fact that he’s coming off missing back-to-back games with a hamstring injury, meaning that his numbers have just come in eight appearances.

Yet, it’s a sign of how he’s fit into this attack, as his strong start is as much a reflection of his good play as it is how his teammates around him are playing off their striker, too.

“I’m finding good areas,” Wright said of his scoring run. “The ball’s finding me this year a little bit more, and I’m being a little bit more clinical, last year I had some chances, but didn’t score enough goals. This year, I’m finding myself in the right areas, and I’m  burying them right now.”

His goals in this game showed that. Certainly, Wright deserves credit with how he was able to score two expert finishes, but the passes to find him were also key.

On the first goal, it took a creative ball from Austin Ricci, who could’ve rushed his cross, while Ferrari’s pass was one of high difficulty, especially given that he was cutting in on his week foot.

At the same time, that both were able to complete such passes is also a reflection of the work Wright is doing off the ball, as he’s making sure to get open, providing a target for his teammates to find him.

Through that synchronicity, it’s given a big boost to this York attack, who is now up to 15 goals in 10 games, good for second in the league as of writing. After scoring the fifth-most goals in the CPL in 2023, that’s given them a big boost, as a game like this one showed.

Because of that, look for Wright’s return from injury to continue to help York’s attack forward. Having lacked that synchronicity with his teammates in his first season with York last year, some good chemistry is building in his second year up front for the club, and it certainly helped them in this game.

“The goals are a consequence of his movements and what he does to to worry the centre backs,” Mora said of Wright. “He’s a strong player, he knows the game, he knows when to pounce, he knows when to make runs, he was pressing really good, he kept a good distance between himself and Ricci, and he was sacrificing for the team until he couldn’t anymore because his game fitness is only improving after (his injury).”

“So for me, the reference we had with Brian was very important.”

CanPL.ca Player of the Match

Brian Wright, York United

Wright played a pivotal role in York’s victory with his brace, giving them the goals they needed to reward their strong defensive performance.

Despite having limited touches, as he finished with just 23, he made the most of his opportunities, finishing with three shots, making his two clinical goals seem even more impressive.

What’s next?

Atlético Ottawa will head out on the road to Alberta next week, as they get set for a clash with Cavalry FC at ATCO Field on Friday, June 21st (7 p.m. MT/9 p.m. ET). Meanwhile, York won’t have much time to rest, as they get set to host Pacific FC for a midweek clash at York Lions Stadium on Wednesday, June 19th (4 p.m. PT/7 p.m. ET).

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