Final Score: Pacific FC 2-0 Valour FC
Goalscorers: Heard 48′, Young 78′
Game of the 2024 season: 6
CPL match: 490

Match in a minute or less

Pacific continued their perfect start to 2024 on Friday, as they picked up a 2-0 win over Valour FC to make it two wins and two clean sheets from two games to begin the new CPL season.

After a slow start, Pacific was able to break things open in the second half, as Josh Heard found the net in the 48th minute, before Sean Young added a second in the 78th minute to seal the game for his team.

As a result, they were able to take home all three points on the night, ensuring that they’ll at least finish this weekend tied atop the table thanks to their haul of six points from those first two games.

Three Observations

Aggresive half time switch paves way for strong Pacific second half:

Both teams had a quiet start to this game, as they struggled to find their feet early, unable to break the game open in possession. Instead, most teams spent the game on the periphery of proceedings, looking for a spark that could provide the ignition that this match needed.

Ultimately, it wouldn’t come in the first half, as both teams combined for just two shots on target, with the half time Expected Goals (xG), which were 0.44 for Pacific to 0.31 for Valour, giving an idea of the sort of match that it had been up to that point.

Because of that, Pacific’s head coach, James Merriman, decided to turn to an interesting motivation tactic to begin the half. Feeling that his team could’ve done more to come out firing from the start, instead of playing with sleepy legs, he elected to make the rare decision to bring in three new fresh faces at half time as part of a triple substitution.

Perhaps a harsh decision for those who were withdrawn in that scenario, as it felt like most of the 22 players on the pitch in that first half could’ve all been guilty of not having the most energy to begin the game, but it sent a clear message – things needed to be better for Pacific. In fact, when looking at the nature of those substitutions, that certainly seemed to be the case – Merriman chose to withdraw a player from each line of the field, swapping out defender Paul Amedume, midfielder Pierre Lamothe and attacker Ayman Sellouf for Cédric Toussaint, Kunle Dada-Luke and Josh Heard, showing that he wanted more from his team.

To his credit, however, his strategy ended up paying dividends for his team in the end. The impact was immediate, too – it took just three minutes into the second half for Pacific to find the net, with two of their substitutes playing a big role in the goal in Toussaint and Heard, and then they kept their foot on the gas pedal from there, allowing them to later grab a second and seal the game.

“We weren’t on the front foot,” Sean Young said after the game of his team’s slow start. “And at home, we want to be on the ball, we want to be first to second balls, to 50-50s, and we didn’t feel like anyone was on their best game. But that happened, and like great teams do, at halftime we got back to playing how we wanted to play and we got a result.”

The second half stats paint a picture of how dominant of a showing it was, as well – Pacific ended up besting Valour in most key offensive categories in the second half, including shots (10-2), shots on target (7-1), xG (1.31-0.05) and big chances (3-0), giving an idea of how the risk of making those half time substitutions completely changed the game for them.

A risk that could’ve easily gone against Pacific, as it always is when you use that many substitutions early in a game, it instead provided the jolt of energy that this game needed.

Yet, it shouldn’t be surprising to see Pacific employ that sort of aggressive strategy. Always eager to win games, especially at home, they’re always willing to take those sort of risks if it means it gives them the best shot at all three points, as they were able to do in this game.

Therefore, while Merriman remained coy when asked what the exact message was to his team at half time, he’s hoping they can take it to heart and build off what they showed in the second half.

“We’ll keep the message at halftime to ourselves,” he coyly said, “But we knew that (what we showed) in the first half wasn’t us, so we spoke a lot about responding and putting in a better performance, as we were not good enough in the first half. We knew that as a team, so we challenged ourselves to be more vertical, more direct, more attack-minded and to really attack the game.”

He added: “So while we’re not happy with that first half, we’ll take this response in the second half and we’ll build on it, as it’s only the second game of the season.”

Valour left to rue lack of execution in both thirds:

Sometimes, a scoreline doesn’t tell the full story of how a team played on the day, and Valour will feel that this was the case in this one.

Overall, 2-0 is a fair scoreline in the game, reflecting Pacific’s second-half dominance, but despite that, it felt like Valour could’ve very well gotten more out of this one than they ultimately did, especially after a strong start.

Across the balance of the game, they put in a pretty solid showing on both sides of the ball, but were ultimately undone by one key factor – their execution at both ends, with the second half standing out in this regard, as was noted afterwards.

“This one was really frustrating, as we had such a great first half,” Valour’s Abdou Samaké noted. “We felt that we were right there, we were pushing and that maybe the goals were coming, so we started the second half pretty aggressive, we were pressing all the way towards their goal line, and then it ends up in our net (right away), and that’s very frustrating.”

Defensively, they’ll feel very frustrated with how Pacific’s goals came about, which were on direct, swift attacking play. Especially the first goal, where Valour ended up getting quite stretched after spending most of the game in a compact and organized defensive structure, they’ll feel that they could’ve done better to limit how Pacific were able to play through them on those two tallies.

Then, offensively, they once again occupied good areas in the attack, completing more passes in Pacific’s final third than Pacific did in theirs (131 to 109), but they were unable to turn their sequences of play in that area of the pitch into any dangerous opportunities, finishing with zero big chances generated in this game.

In fact, there’s one key stat that reflects their struggles on the day – their front three of Abdul Binate, Shaan Hundal and Jordi Swibel only combined for six touches in Pacific’s box. Given Valour’s territorial advantage in Pacific’s final third, they will feel that they could’ve fed them the ball a lot more than they ultimately did in the end.

Therefore, look for that to be the big focus heading into their third game of the season, helping them iron out those little details that are hurting them at both ends. Overall, the fact that they’ve been outscored 6-1 through two games doesn’t fairly reflect how they’ve played, but that won’t matter when it comes to the standings at the end of the year.

Sometimes, the difference in any given game can come down to execution, something that Valour were unable to do at both ends in this game.

For what it’s worth, these mistakes are very correctable, and because of that, head coach Phil Dos Santos remains bullish when it comes to what his team can become, noting that he feels things will only come with time for his group.

One that is integrating a lot of new faces into the team, they’ll need time to find chemistry and figure out their best combinations, with games like this one providing them key learning lessons to apply on that journey.

“I think we’re missing that final detail,” Dos Santos said. “We need to be a bit more pragmatic. (For example), there are actions where you’d want your forward to get in the box, not to run away from goal, but to instead try and win something, try to get a shot at goal, be little bit more pragmatic, a little bit more aggressive.”

“But I think it’s going to come, we need more games at this rhythm and at this intensity for these little details to kick in.”

“We keep moving forward,” Samaké added. “We’re very happy with the way that our relationships our starting to grow and build, as it’s only game #2. We’re in here for the long run, it’s a long season and we have big objectives, so we move forward.”

Gazdov paces another strong Pacific defensive showing:

While Pacific remain far from satisfied with their overall play as a team through two games, there’s one area where they can certainly be pleased with how they’ve played so far – their defence, as they were able keep a clean sheet for a second straight game.

Not only that, but they were full value for their clean sheet, too, limiting Valour to just seven shots for a total of 0.35 xG, as they did an excellent job of ensuring that they didn’t face too many high-quality shots on the day.

Then, in the moments where their defence did get breached, goalkeeper Emil Gazdov came up big to keep them in the game, making some key stops, doing well to follow up a player of the match showing from week 1.

Yet, Gazdov’s play has arguably been quite instrumental in this early Pacific push, as he’s certainly taken a big step forward to start this new season. His second full season as Pacific starter, his confidence has been noticeable, as he’s been quite commanding in both of his team’s games so far.

That’s rubbing off on his teammates, too, as defenders can often feed off the energy of their goalkeeper, especially if they’re suffering from a dip in confidence. Unfortunately, Pacific felt that at times last year, as Gazdov understandably dealt with some of the growing pains that a young goalkeeper can experience at this level.

Now, however, he’s seemed to put that behind him, and that’s been huge for Pacific.

Already one of the best defensive teams by advanced metrics last year, at least in terms of the chances allowed, they didn’t always play with the confidence to match that, as they always felt like they had to be perfect to keep a clean sheet. As a result, they played like it, scared not to make any mistakes that would disrupt their rhythm, which could lead to stiff and nervous performances.

Now, however, the confidence is palpable across the defensive line right now, and it’s allowing them to defend aggressively, which is where they’re at their best.

Plus, they’ve still got a lot of growth to come, too. It can be easy to forget, but Gazdov is just 20, and he’s playing behind a group that is still figuring each other out, meaning that they’ll only continue to develop chemistry as this season goes along.

As they keep trying to figure out what their attack looks like, noting after the game that they remain far from satisfied with how they’ve played in possession to start this year, at least they know that they can continue to undergo that process with the confidence that their defence will continue to keep them in games.

Once again, that was the case in this game, as they were able to break things open with two key moments of magic, which combined with the strong showing, allowed them to turn a frustrating performance into a comfortable victory.

“I think we’re hard on ourselves, because we expect to be better, cleaner, more dominant and dictate the game with the ball, and we know where that we haven’t been there in the last two games,” Merriman explained. “But we have to give credit to the way that we defended, especially in front of our goal, and then Emil (Gazdov) made some great saves, as well.”

“He made two big saves in the Halifax match, and then a few big saves today, when asked (to step up), he’s been there, and those are moments that we didn’t see at the beginning of last year.”

“But when we speak about his potential, this is the potential, he can be a big goalkeeper for us, so it’s a great start for him and for us as a team with how we’ve defended in front of his goal.”

CanPL.ca Player of the Match

Sean Young, Pacific FC

It was a big week for Young, who inked a new contract, made his 100th appearance for Pacific in this game, and is set to celebrate his 24th birthday on Saturday, and he ensured to cap it off with an excellent performance in midfield.

Of course, his goal will stand out, but his overall play will be what he’s most pleased with, as he completed 50 out of 56 passes (89%), created two chances, had two shots and completed all five of his long balls offensively, and chipped in with one tackle, one clearance, three interceptions and eight recoveries defensively, putting in a shift on both sides of the ball in this one.

What’s next?

Pacific FC will head out on the road for the first time this season, as they get set to play Cavalry at ATCO Field on Sunday, April 28th (2 p.m. PT/3 p.m. MT), while Valour will head across the country for a date with Forge at Tim Hortons Field on Saturday, April 27th (3 p.m. CT/4 p.m. ET).

Watch all CPL matches live on OneSoccer. In addition to its website and app, OneSoccer is now available on TELUS channel 980 and on Fubo TV. Call your local cable provider to ask for OneSoccer today.