Final Score: Vancouver FC 0-3 Forge FC
Goalscorers: Pacius 19′, 28′, 47′ (PK)
Game of the 2023 season: 88
CPL match: 455

Match in a minute or less

Forge snapped a four-game winless run on Sunday, as they picked up a 3-0 win over Vancouver FC at Langley’s Willoughby Community Park, allowing them to climb into a tie for second place in the Canadian Premier League.

Yet, a big reason for that was the performance of Forge’s Woobens Pacius, who ended up being the hero for his side with a hat trick.

First, Pacius opened the scoring for Forge with a well-taken header in the 19th minute, before slotting home a flicked cross in the 28th minute to complete his brace.

Then, he capped off his hat trick with a perfect penalty in the 47th minute, allowing Forge to cruise to victory from there, as they claimed a much-needed three points in their push towards the playoffs.

Three Observations

Woobens Pacius reverses fortunes with a well-taken hat trick:

After scoring 19 goals across his first year and a half in the Canadian Premier League, there’s no doubt that Woobens Pacius is one of the best in the CPL in terms of finding the back of the net on a regular basis.

Yet, after his exploits in 2021 (seven goals across regular season and playoffs) and 2022 (12 goals), things have slowed down for Pacius this year, as he entered this game with just four goals through the first 22 games of the season.

He’s done well to improve other areas of his game, such as his chance creation, sitting with a career-high three assists, but the goals have remained far more elusive than he’s used to.

To be fair, it’s not for a lack of trying – entering this game, he was 10th in the CPL in terms of xG generated with 4.3, showing that he’d been a bit unlucky not to score more than he had.

Because of that, it had felt like he was due for an offensive outburst of sorts, allowing him to catch up on some of the missed goals.

Safe to say, he did that in this game. Given that he nearly matched his output on the season inside just 47 minutes, doing so on just 1.03 xG, he returned to his usual service and then some on the day with two good finishes in the box to go along with the penalty.

That was huge for Forge, who had entered this game with just one goal across their last two games, and none in open play, giving them a much-needed injection of life up front.

Plus, it should only give Pacius some confidence at a crucial point of the season, too. With the CPL title race remaining wide-open, Forge has a real chance at finishing first if they go on a run over the next few games.

Should they do that, however, having Pacius in form will only help. Given that Forge’s defence has struggled with inconsistency all season long, as despite keeping a league-leading nine clean sheets, they’ve conceded the fourth-most goals with 26, that means any sort of consistent offence will go a long way for them.

No doubt, they’ve got options up front who can provide that for them, especially at the striker position – Pacius is now up to fourth in the CPL in scoring despite his struggles, while Terran Campbell is tied for the league lead – but given that Forge has been shut out six times and have only sit fourth in league scoring, they’ll also need their attackers to find a bit of consistency.

“He’s a guy in the box who scores goals,” Forge’s head coach, Bobby Smyrniotis, said afterwards of Pacius.” But that’s the thing, we’ve also got another guy who in the box scores goals, Terran Campbell, and he’s been doing well this year, so it’s been a challenge for both of them.”

“Sometimes, one is hot so maybe the other one isn’t getting the minutes they want, but today, we went with a look that we’ve used before in the attack to ensure that we have both of those guys in and around the box, because if you do that, you’ll always increase your possibilities to score.”

Speaking of consistency, however, that’s the next step that Pacius will want to take – to build off this performance.

That’s often the biggest challenge for a striker, as it can be hard to score with regularity, so Pacius will look to find a way to now go on a run.

Using the boost that scoring a hat trick can provide, that’s the challenge he’ll undertake now, something that he’s relishing.

“Yeah, it’s always always nice (to score a hat trick), it’s always a great feeling,” Pacius said. “I was able to do it last year, so to be able to do it another time this year, it’s an amazing feeling.”

“Preventable” goals sink Vancouver after bright start: 

It can be the most frustrating feeling for a team.

Despite coming out strong against the defending champions, they were left to pick the ball out of their net just 19 minutes into the game, as they fell asleep at a crucial moment on the second phase of a corner.

Then, as they tried to mount a comeback, they had another moment to forget defensively, as Forge managed to score off another wide ball, leaving Vancouver to chase a 2-0 deficit after less than a half-hour.

Frustrating on any day, it was especially painful for Vancouver given that they’d actually outshot Forge five to three in the first half, generating 0.35 xG to Forge’s 0.25.

Yet, due to their defensive lapses, and some lacklustre finishing, Vancouver had left themselves in a big rut as the second half loomed.

There, however, was another good learning lesson for Vancouver, as they got a taste of what often distinguishes the top teams from the rest of the pack. Sometimes, you can have good flashes across a game, but if you don’t take advantage of them, top teams will pounce.

Unfortunately for Vancouver, they dealt with that, first-hand, leaving them to suffer another tough result.

“I think all three goals were very elementary, it was kindergarten, schoolyard goals,” Vancouver head coach, Afshin Ghotbi, said. “And as a manager, that’s frustrating to see, because we worked so hard to teach the right principles in defence and attack, and to instill the right habits in our team, but that goes back to our youth, and it goes back to the way that they manage various moments in a game as a player. ”

“In professional football, it’s all about doing the simple things well, and when you don’t do the simple things well on a consistent basis, then you struggle to succeed in professional football, and that’s our challenge as a team and our challenge for our players right now.”

Now, it’s left their playoff hopes to hang on by a thread, leaving a tall task for them with six games to go.

The good news, however, is that these are the sort of lessons that remain valuable for an expansion team to learn. Even if they don’t make the playoffs, these games are a good chance to play playoff-style matches, as a team like Forge was always going to bring the intensity on the day.

At the end of the day, this next stretch of games won’t just be crucial for picking up results in the short-term, but also for building good habits for the long term, which is where lessons like this one will prove to be valuable.

“I think we did well,” Vancouver’s Kadin Chung explained. “There are obviously moments that we need to be better at, especially on the goals, as I think they’re preventable, but I don’t think we gave them too much in that first half, we were on the ball a lot, and we played really well with it when we were patient.”

“Obviously, there are times where we need to work on dictating the tempo and maybe retaining possession a bit more, but I thought for the most part, we did well, I think that first half was some of the best football we played all year, so now we just got to keep that going into the next one, and try to build off it.”

Forge’s midfield helps them to comfortably see out win:

It’s no secret – a lot of Forge’s success runs through the middle of the park.

Given the options that they’ve got in that area of the pitch, it’s an area of the pitch that they love to prioritize, as they often try to outnumber their opponents there whenever possible.

Sometimes, that means playing a box midfield with four central midfielders, while other times that means playing with three in the middle.

In this game, they chose to go with the latter, as they aimed to attack Vancouver in wide channels in a 3-5-2 on the ball, with the goal being to funnel the ball towards Pacius and Campbell up front.

Which, to their credit, ended up working perfectly, especially through the first 50 minutes, given that all three of their goals came from wide balls into their forwards, as well as some of their best chances.

Yet, while the first half was relatively straightforward for their midfielders, Kyle Bekker, Aboubacar Sissoko and Alexander Achinioti-Jönsson, who did well to neutralize Vancouver’s threat in that area of the pitch, they then really found their feet in the second half.

Aided by a switch by Vancouver to more of a 4-2-3-1, Forge really started to impose themselves in midfield, forcing Vancouver to attack wide channels, while then throwing the ball right back up the middle in transition.

As a result, after a relatively even first half statistically, Forge pulled away in the second half, outshooting Vancouver nine to five, while generating three big chances and six shots inside the box.

Plus, it didn’t come from the sort of dominance that many are used to seeing from Forge’s midfielders, either – they had to do lot of important running off the ball on both sides of possession, and played a bit more direct than usual. Especially once Khadim Kane came off the bench, that really became pronounced, which allowed them to have all sorts of joy in transition against Vancouver.

Therefore, despite not winning the possession battle, or having the high volume of touches that many are used to seeing from them, it was a good showing from Forge’s midfielders, who showed their value to their team once again.

Yet, expect to see a lot of that over this final stretch. Often, Forge’s at their best when their midfield is ticking, and they certainly were doing that in this game.

“We’ve been playing some good football lately,” Smyrniotis said. “But we had three ties in our last three games, and we’d thought that we were good for maybe a few more points in those ones that we got, so we knew the importance of this one, we needed this one today to be able to stay in the race for the playoffs, as well as the title race.”

CanPL.ca Player of the Match

Woobens Pacius, Forge FC

It was the dream performance for any striker, as Pacius managed to nab a very well-taken hat trick inside just 47 minutes. Not only that, but it came as part of a complete showing from Pacius, too, as he completed 25 out of 29 passes (86%), including four out of five long balls, to go along with four recoveries defensively.

Because of that, it was a good showing from the Forge striker, one that proved to be crucial for his team on the day.

What’s next?

Vancouver FC will remain at home for their next game, as they get set to welcome Atlético Ottawa to Willoughby Community Park on Saturday, September 9th (7:00 p.m. PT/10:00 p.m. ET). Meanwhile, Forge will return home to take on league-leaders Cavalry at Tim Hortons Field earlier that same Saturday (5:00 p.m. MT/7:00 p.m.ET).

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