Welcome to CPL5x5. In preparation for the 2023 Canadian Premier League season — the fifth since the league’s inception in 2019 — CanPL.ca will provide full, in-depth preview coverage for each of the eight clubs.
In this series, we’ll break down all you need to know about each team within five sections: Five stats, five key players, five fixtures to circle, five storylines to watch, and five quotes.
To check out the rest of CanPL.ca’s 2023 season preview coverage, click here. To see the other seven clubs’ CPL5x5 breakdowns, click here.
Vancouver FC enters this season with a totally blank slate. The Canadian Premier League’s newest expansion team, VFC have signed an entire roster from scratch, hired Afshin Ghotbi to be the club’s first head coach, and will play out of a newly-built stadium, Willoughby Park at Langley Events Centre.
As an expansion team coming into a league with seven teams that are more established, Vancouver will have some hurdles to overcome in year one, but their exciting and ambitious squad could do some great things on and off the pitch.
5 STATS
0 Games Played:
Vancouver FC has never played a competitive match, but will play in two competitions in the first week of the 2022 season. They start by visiting Pacific FC on the CPL’s opening day, before travelling to Ontario for a Canadian Championship preliminary round match against York United. They will be at York Lions Stadium again that weekend.
4,407 kilometres:
The distance between Vancouver’s home stadium at the Langley Events Centre and Wanderers Grounds, the home of the Halifax Wanderers, as measured in a straight line. This is by far Vancouver’s longest away trip, and would be the longest in the CPL if not for fellow B.C. club Pacific FC being a bit further from the east coast.
The closest stadium to Langley, Starlight Stadium – home of the Tridents – is almost exactly 100 km away to the southwest.
7 countries coached in:
Canada is the seventh country that experienced coach Afshin Ghotbi has worked in. The Vancouver boss has previously worked in his native Iran, as well as the United States, South Korea, Japan, Thailand and China, including reaching the World Cup semifinal with South Korea in 2002.
119 appearances:
Vancouver’s star signing thus far has been attacker Gael Sandoval, who has made 119 appearances in Liga MX, his native Mexico’s top flight. Sandoval, playing for Santos Laguna at the time, was crowned the league’s best rookie in 2016-17, and won the 2018 Concacaf Champions League with Chivas.
1st and 2nd overall:
Vancouver FC have shown a commitment to their first two draft picks in club history, signing both to contracts for the 2023 season. First overall pick Anthony White, a centre-back out of the University of Toronto, has signed a two-year contract with the club, while Ameer Kinani from Toronto Metropolitan University has signed a CPL-U SPORTS contract for this season, allowing him to keep his university eligibility.
5 KEY PLAYERS
Callum Irving
A CPL champion with Pacific FC in 2021, Callum Irving has proven himself as one of the best goalkeepers in the league over the past few seasons. The Vancouver native crossed the Strait of Georgia to join VFC this offseason, and was the first player to join the CPL’s newest club.
He’ll be a veteran leader on what will be a somewhat inexperienced team, and without a doubt the team’s number one choice in net.
Kadin Chung
After three years and a CPL title with Irving and Pacific FC, Kadin Chung earned himself an opportunity in Major League Soccer with Toronto FC last year. After dealing with injuries and inconsistent playing time in Toronto, Chung has returned to his home province, signing for the CPL’s newest club where he is expected to be a leader in the dressing room and the team’s starting right back.
Chung was one of the best players in the CPL through the league’s first three seasons, and he’ll be hoping to recapture that form in 2022.
Gael Sandoval
There are high expectations for the player that is undoubtedly Vancouver’s first marquee signing. The 27-year-old Mexican winger is coming to the Canadian Premier League with a strong pedigree, as a Concacaf Champions League winner and off the back of a season in the Australian A-League in which he scored six times and added five assists in 20 games.
He’s the type of player that is capable of special things, and will be the star up top for VFC this season.
Gabriel Bitar
Joining his third CPL club after previously taking the pitch for Cavalry FC and FC Edmonton, Gabriel Bitar is looking to continue his upwards trajectory. Last season on a struggling Eddies team, Bitar scored five goals and added an assist, one of the focal points in midfield for the club.
He also received his first call up to the Lebanon national team in December, making his debut against the United Arab Emirates. When he’s fit and firing, Bitar has the ability to take over games and quarterback the attack, and VFC will be hoping to get even more of that out of him this season.
Rocco Romeo
Players with CPL experience are a useful addition to any club looking to add to their roster – just ask Atletico Ottawa last season, who added CPL experience to their squad and immediately shot up the standings. This Vancouver FC team doesn’t have a ton of CPL experience, but the players who have been in the league before could prove to be vital. One of those players is centre-back Rocco Romeo.
A commanding, physical centre-back, Romeo will be a key player for Vancouver, as one of Afshin Ghotbi’s first-choice defenders. He has all the potential in the world, but struggled a bit for consistency at Valour FC the past two years. This season could be the one where he takes the next step and emerges as a top defender in this league.
5 FIXTURES TO CIRCLE
April 15: Pacific FC vs. Vancouver FC
This was an easy one – the club’s first ever match. Already an exciting event in itself as the Canadian Premier League welcomes a new club, the occasion is heightened by who Vancouver FC will be playing against – fellow British Columbia side Pacific FC. A couple of former Pacific FC stars – Callum Irving and Kadin Chung – are among the players to “join the dark side”, as the club likes to say, adding to what is already expected to be a local rivalry once it kicks off.
April 19: York United vs. Vancouver FC
Two games, two competitions. In just their second competitive match in club history, Vancouver FC will head to Ontario to take on York United in a midweek Canadian Championship clash at York Lions Stadium. It will be their first foray into the national cup competition, with the winner moving on to host the Vancouver Whitecaps in the quarterfinals. The Whitecaps knocked York out of last year’s competition, and are of course another local rival for VFC, so the winner gets a huge home game with a lot on the line.
After that match, VFC will remain in Ontario, facing York again in CPL action that weekend.
May 7: Vancouver FC vs. Cavalry FC
Another milestone game for the club, Vancouver FC will welcome Cavalry FC to town for their first ever home game at the Langley Events Centre on May 7. It will be their fourth league game of the season, with that Canadian Championship game against York United mixed in as well, so they will be hoping to have gotten off to a good start and put on a good show for their supporters.
June 2: Vancouver FC vs. Pacific FC
In early June, Pacific FC will make their first trip to Langley for a B.C. derby match at the home of VFC. The first match of the season between the two will likely start a bit slower as both teams begin their seasons and get a feel for each other, but by June expect a more intense fixture as the rivalry starts to kick off and teams start jockeying for positions in the table.
September 9: Vancouver FC vs. Atlético Ottawa
The CPL’s new expanded playoff format will see five teams make it into the postseason for the first time. The race for spots will be as tight as ever, and the battles for spots will likely come right down to the wire again. With about a month left in their inaugural season, Vancouver will go through a difficult three-match stretch that sees them play the two 2022 finalists, Forge FC and Atlético Ottawa at home before heading to Calgary to take on another perennial playoff team in Cavalry FC.
If they’re up near that top five, that stretch could be vital to where they finish in the standings. The game against Ottawa will be sandwiched in the middle of the three, arguably the most important as they look to either continue a strong momentum or get back in the win column before playing Cavalry away in the third match.
5 STORYLINES TO WATCH
Expect the unexpected
Vancouver FC are somewhat of an unknown heading into their inaugural season. With only some information from preseason for other teams to scout from, and a roster featuring many players that are young and new to the league, there are a lot of question marks about who will be the key players will be, what their tactical identity could look like, and how they react to certain situations.
Vancouver could be a very good team in year one, but only time will tell.
Will Gael Sandoval live up to the hype?
Vancouver FC made one of the most high-profile signings in CPL history, signing Mexican winger Gael Sandoval. He’s been touted by the club as a “statement player”, and has a strong resume, but now the challenge is to live up to that. Vancouver has a talented roster, but he will be the focal point, expected to set up goals and score some himself.
Will a young team lack veteran experience?
With the exception of a small handful of players, much of Vancouver FC’s roster is made up of players in their early 20s and first-year professionals. While talented, some of them have never gone through a full professional season before, and will need to rely on the leaders in the locker room at times.
Callum Irving and Kadin Chung have won the North Star Shield before and Elliot Simmons is another player who can lead from midfield, but overall this team doesn’t have many longtime professionals for younger players to lean on – like an Ashtone Morgan at Forge FC or a Drew Beckie in Ottawa last season.
Afshin Ghotbi’s experience as a manager will help with that, but it could be a factor during what will be an action-packed campaign.
The importance of making their home stadium a fortress
Playing at home is usually a huge boost for some clubs, especially in the Canadian Premier League, where teams like Cavalry FC and the Halifax Wanderers have often used loud home crowds to their advantage. If Vancouver attracts passionate fans to their new 6,560-capacity stadium and gives them something to cheer about, they could create an atmosphere that other CPL teams won’t look forward to visiting from the very start.
Can Kadin Chung recapture past CPL form?
After three incredible years with Pacific FC, capped off by the 2021 North Star Shield, right back Kadin Chung moved up to Major League Soccer with Toronto FC. He wasn’t able to find consistent playing time, however, and after just one season in MLS, returned back to the CPL – signing with Vancouver FC.
From nearby Coquitlam, B.C., Chung will be a key part of the club’s plans for their inaugural season – one of the club’s most important players on the pitch, as well as a recognized CPL star off the pitch. If he can find the form that saw him emerge as one of the best players in the league in 2021, Vancouver could unlock a dangerous way to attack opponents down the right flank.
5 QUOTES
“There is that motivation and that urge for me to prove myself again. I feel like I can play at [the MLS] level again, hopefully at another stage in my career. CPL was what got me to that level. I know I can get back there again, so I’m hoping to use this first and foremost to be a part of this team and bring success to Vancouver, but also to get back to the level that got me my first MLS contract.”
— Fullback Kadin Chung on returning to the CPL
“I’m born and raised in Vancouver and when you see a club with the name Vancouver FC, I think you see yourself with that a little bit.”
— Goalkeeper Callum Irving on representing his hometown with VFC
“I will show the people what I can do, but not because I’m trying to be the star of the league. If a team works together for a long time, they win tournaments. I played in Mexico at that level, it’s different yes, but now I’m here and I’ll try to do my best, try to be a good team like a family. I’ll show you everything we can do for a good team.”
— Forward Gael Sandoval on his expectations in Vancouver
“I’ve been involved in a lot of difficult and challenging projects. If you follow my career, partly because of my origin and because of being Iranian-American, I don’t get teams like Bayern Munich or Real Madrid or Man City, I get teams that I have to really build from being either a medium level or being a low level, and I have to build them up. It’s become part of my skillset that I can make players better, make teams better. I can make lemonade out of a lemon and I can try to create an atmosphere that brings the best out of the group. I do believe in the philosophy that we need to kind of create a team that the whole is greater than the sum.”
— Head coach Afshin Ghotbi on the challenging road ahead
“This stadium will become the heartbeat of the community for years to come and is a very flexible amenity that can expand as the sport of soccer continues to grow in Canada.”
— Managing Partner of SixFive Sports & Entertainment, Dean Shillington, on building a new stadium in Langley
