Final Score: Pacific FC 1-1 Cavalry FC
Goalscorers: Yeates 6′; Warschewski 68′
Game of the 2024 season: 29
CPL match: 513

Match in a minute or less

Pacific FC and Cavalry drew 1-1 in their second meeting of the CPL season at Starlight Stadium on Saturday, leaving them to split the points after a cagey match.

The hosts opened the scoring early in this one, as Kunle Dada-Luke found Steffen Yeates with a perfect cross in the sixth minute, giving Pacific a 1-0 lead.

Then, Cavalry responded in the second half, as a furious offensive push finally led them to find the net in the 68th minute, with Tobias Warschewski powering one home on a cross from Bradley Kamdem to make it 1-1.

From there, despite a late Pacific push that nearly saw them grab a winner with two glorious chances late on, both teams were left to settle for the draw in the end.

Three Observations

Game of three acts finishes in a deserved draw:

Operating on tired legs after an emotional match in midweek, Pacific knew that they had to start out strongly, before wary legs started to take hold later in the match. As a result, it wasn’t surprising to see them come flying out of the gates, grabbing a goal through their efforts.

From there, they were able to sit back a little more and force Cavalry to try and break them down, instead of exerting too much energy in search of a second marker. Certainly, they wanted that second goal, knowing that Cavalry was very much capable of breaking the game open and finding an equalizer, but they knew that an open game would only likely finish in Cavalry’s favour.

To their credit, they did well to frustrate their guests, but Cavalry started to grow into this one, and started to take the game over to end the first half, and maintained that early into the second half, allowing them to grab an equalizer.

Because of that, it put Pacific in a tough position late in the second half, as Cavalry seemed to be the likelier team to win the game, with the momentum in their favour and the fresher legs to push them.

Despite that, Pacific managed to dig deep and nearly regained their lead on, finishing strongly. They weren’t able to find a late result, but given the fatigue they were fighting, it was an impressive response.

Unable to find that late winner, however, that left a draw as a deserved result, and the stats backed it up – the shots (11-9 for Cavalry), shots on target (3-3) and the xG (0.81 to 0.6 for Pacific) all showed that it was a relatively even affair.

Interestingly, however, both teams ended up having differing perspectives on what this draw meant for them.

For Pacific, they saw it as two points dropped, especially after leading in this game, given that they were also playing at home. Not unreasonable given that a tough road schedule now awaits them over the next stretch, it was still always going to be tough to win this one amid their busy week, yet that they were frustrated not to is a sign of the mentality that exists within their group, which is one that wants to win games.

“I thought we got off to a good start, maybe in the second half we weren’t as fresh as we wanted to be, we weren’t as much on the front foot as we wanted to be,” Pacific’s Steffen Yeates explained. “We’re unlucky tonight not to get the three points, but we’ll take the one point for now and just try to build off of it.”

“We were excellent to start the game, but we needed to score a second goal,” Pacific’s head coach, James Merriman, added. “We need to finish off the game, and I think it was there for us, but in the last act, in our decision making towards goal, we needed to be more ruthless, more direct.”

“We’re still learning, that’s still part of our process for this season, and we knew that Cavalry were always going to come and find a way back into the game, then we had great chances in the second half, and we didn’t take those either. So it’s frustrating, I think the game is there for us to win today, we left two points on the table and we should be taking all three points today, in our opinion.”

As for Cavalry, however, they were a little more positive about this result. Certainly, they were frustrated given that they now remain with just one win in eight games, having drawn six of those matches, but head coach Tommy Wheeldon Jr viewed a road draw like this one against a good team as a positive one.

“I’m pleased with our response,” Wheeldon Jr. said. “Context is key, because I think if we just keep focusing on the results and the draws and take that as a negative, I don’t know if that’s right. It’s a half win (today). We’ve come to a place where Pacific was on a high after being Ottawa who have been terrific in the league themselves, and they played with that level of inspiration and in the first 15-20, they surprised us, but what I like about our team is that they adapted and they came back.”

Certainly, his players didn’t view that way, and understandably so, given that they’ll be frustrated with their lack of wins, but they’ll have to use this game as a springboard going forward.

With some crucial home games ahead, including dates with Forge and Atlético Ottawa over their next three games, those are matches they’ll want to win to turn around this slump.

At their best, Cavalry is a side that has shown they can win in tough locales, but they’ll need to build some momentum before they can return to those ways, which may only come after a home win.

“It’s getting frustrating, I’m not going to lie,” Cavalry’s Daan Klomp said. “I feel like we have chances every game, and I feel we have the better chances every game, and then in the last 10 minutes we had to throw everything forward because I think everybody is a bit sick of drawing games.”

Ayman Sellouf’s new role continues to provide benefit to Pacific’s attack:

For a second straight CPL match, Pacific’s attacking talisman, Ayman Sellouf, was tasked with a different role – playing as more of a #10 underneath Pacific’s front line instead of playing out wide on the left as he is typically accustomed to.

After a strong performance in midweek in that new role, as he scored and helped create another goal in Pacific’s 2-1 win over Atlético Ottawa in the 2nd leg of their Canadian Championship quarter-final tie, that wasn’t too surprising to see, however.

Sometimes prone to getting isolated when playing out wide, with teams eager to shut him down by double or triple-teaming him out of possession, his move to the middle has given him more freedom in possession.

At his most comfortable when he’s able to drive at defenders off the dribble, playing centrally has afforded him the luxury of doing so more regularly, as defences can’t risk clogging up the middle to try and slow him down.

The reason for that? Pacific’s wide threats, who have benefitted the most from Sellouf’s new position.

This game showed that, with the goal serving as the perfect example of what that can look like. With Cavalry’s defence having tucked in to defend the central areas, that freed up Pacific to spray the ball out wide to a Kunle Dada-Luke, who was able to take advantage of the space provided to himself to whip in a perfect cross to Steffen Yeates for Pacific’s opener.

Dada-Luke wasn’t the only one to benefit from that space, either. Josh Heard was lively on the right once again after a strong midweek performance, while Dario Zanatta was able to drift out left on a few occasions when the opportunity presented itself.

Then, more centrally, Pacific’s midfielders have benefitted from the tweak, too, with Sellouf serving as an outlet for them to play off of in possession. In particular, Yeates is someone who has benefitted from Sellouf’s new position, as it’s given him more freedom to get forward and play aggressively in the attack.

That helped him score his goal, as he would’ve been unlikely to make that sort of run if he had a natural #9 in front of him, and that caught Cavalry by surprise.

“Yeah, me and Ayman have a good relationship on and off the field,” Yeates said. “And that helps us build chemistry. We’re both very technical players, we’re very attack-minded, we want to go forward, we want to be creative, we want to be dangerous.”

Because of that, don’t be surprised to see Sellouf persists in this new role going forward. He may be asked to operate in different variations of this new role, depending on how Pacific wants to line up, but expect him to stay centrally to try and get more involved.

Pacific’s attack has benefitted from it, and while they still have work to do to get to the level they want to be offensively, they’re starting to get the ball into the sort of areas they were struggling to get into weeks prior, which is key.

“He’s got more of a free role to go and find spaces as a true #10 or a false #9,” Merriman said of Sellouf. “And you see him on the ball more, and then you see more of his quality. He’s an exciting, dynamic player, and now creating even more goals and more assists is the challenge for him, but I think he’s been very good (in the middle).”

Wide overloads crucial to Cavalry’s response:

With Pacific sitting in a 4-4-2 off the ball, space was at a premium for Cavalry when attacking in this game, especially in central areas.

That made things tough for their midfielders and attackers, who were unable to find much daylight on the ball in possession, forcing them to spend most of the first half on the periphery when in possession. That ended up having a domino effect on the rest of the team, as it put the pressure on Cavalry’s backline to carry the load in possession, something they struggled to do early on.

It made for a disjointed start to the game for Cavalry, who hit several routine passes straight out of play when building out of the back in the first 30 minutes of play, which played right into Pacific’s hands.

As a result, Cavalry made a key adjustment – they started to push numbers forward from the back, with the goal being to help create more wide overloads.

Through that, they were able to force Pacific to sit back deeper as they tried to limit Cavalry from playing into their midfield, which finally opened up the wide areas for the Cavs.

That ended up giving a big boost to Cavalry’s attack, as they started to get into some dangerous crossing areas, allowing them to put Pacific’s backline under pressure with their service into the box. Naturally, that started to wear down Pacific, leading Cavalry to craft some dangerous chances, before eventually finding their opening goal.

Fittingly, their goal ended up being a perfect example of what they were doing well in the second half, too. After a great overlapping run from their left-sided defender, Bradley Kamdem, who spent the game bouncing between a left back and a left centre back, he was able to whip in the dangerous ball that found a wide-open Warcshewski at the back post for their goal.

Yet, that’s a huge asset that Cavalry can use in the attack. Certainly, they’ve got a talented attacking group, one who can make things happen when given the space to operate, but it can sometimes be tough for those sort of attackers to operate if teams try and sit back and limit space for them.

With Cavalry’s defenders getting involved, however, that can open up that space, and they were able to do that in this game.

“Yeah, we know that for us defenders, we want to help our attackers and find that space for them to cross,” Klomp explained.

Of course, this strategy doesn’t come without risk, as it can sometimes leave them open at the back, but that’s a risk they’re willing to take, sitting as a team that’s always eager to play aggressively and on the front foot whenever possible.

If they’re to get back to winning ways soon, they know that remaining aggressive in their offensive approach will be key, as they noted after the game.

“Yeah, it was very good,” Wheeldon Jr. said of his team’s attack. “In the last 15 minutes, both sides were looking for the win, and I told the lads that I would rather go down swinging than to accept the tie, a tie is a good result away from home, yes, but we wanted to play for all three points.”

“That’s why we brought in Lleyton Brooks and Tobias Warschewski, and they combined very well, then Bradley Kamdem and Fraser Aird helped out.”

“Now, in those attacking moments we need that bit of magic, we’ve got to find it, and that’ll be on us to do.”

CanPL.ca Player of the Match

Steffen Yeates, Pacific FC

Yeates was lively in Pacific’s midfield, scoring the goal as part of a busy performance from the newly minted Trinidad & Tobago international.

As a result, he finished with four chances created, one shot, eight passes into the final third, and seven recoveries in an active performance in the heart of his team’s midfield.

What’s next?

Pacific will make the long cross-country trip to Nova Scotia next weekend, as they get set to play the Halifax Wanderers at Wanderers Grounds on Saturday, June 8th (11:00 a.m. PT/3:00 p.m. AT). Meanwhile, Cavalry will return home to host Forge FC at ATCO Field later that same day (3:00 p.m. MT/5:00 p.m. ET).

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