From the moment the very first ball was kicked in the Canadian Premier League back in 2019, Forge’s Tristan Borges set the standard for individual success.

In the league’s inaugural season, Borges scored 12 goals and added five assists across the Spring and Fall campaigns. No player has managed 17 goal contributions in a campaign since. Borges won the league’s Golden Boot, Player of the Year award and Best Canadian U-21 Player.

Three weeks into the Canadian Premier League’s sixth season, the 25-year-old is once again setting the pace. With two goals and three assists in three Forge victories, Borges has more goal contributions than any player has ever managed through three matchweeks in the CPL.

After a difficult 2023 season, in which injuries and lapses of form limited Borges to just one goal and four assists during the regular season (with no goal contributions at all until the 12th match of the season), he still managed to provide the signature moment from the league’s fifth campaign. His Olimpico, in extra time, to win the 2023 Final against Cavalry was a highlight seen around the world, and seems to have ignited a return to his very best to start 2024.

Fit and confident again, Borges has been included in all three teams of the week so far this season, and on Wednesday was named the league’s Player of the Month for April.

A big part of that success has also come from how Borges has been deployed in 2024. Playing primarily as a central attacking midfielder, he is afforded the freedom to roam around the pitch finding dangerous pockets of space and combining with his talented teammates.

The fluid front four Forge have unleashed on opponents this season of Borges, David Choinière, Béni Badibanga and Terran Campbell clicked instantly. Borges and Choinière often swap positions over the course of games seamlessly, with one operating through the middle and the other finding space on the wing.

Borges’ playmaking ability has always been what has set him apart. Even during a down year in 2023, he remained one of the league’s premier chance creators, with just over three chances created per 90 last season — the most of any player in the CPL. He has matched that rate of chance creation in 2024, with nine already. Below is a look at Borges’ exceptional playmaking in action thus far this season.

In the above clips, Borges shows the immense range of ways he can break down opposing backlines. From cutbacks, to balls over the top, to cheeky flicks, he has an expansive array of weapons at his disposal. He has picked up the most assists in Canadian Premier League history for a reason, and will have his sights set already on breaking the single-season record of nine set by Valour’s Sean Rea in 2022.

The biggest thing that went missing from Borges last season, however, was his shooting boots. Despite winning the Golden Boot in the league’s opening year, that season has proven to be a bit of an outlier, as his next-best output was six goals in 2022.

But with two goals through the first three matches of the campaign, he has already matched his 2024 output in all competitions. The biggest reasons are that, again, he is getting himself into more dangerous positions on the pitch — particularly finding space at the top of the box — and is shooting more frequently. Borges has taken 1.41 shots per 90 inside the box thus far this season, up from just 0.9 in 2023.

He has also already formed a significant connection with CF Monterrey loanee fullback Daniel Parra, who played a key role in both of Borges’ goals this season. Parra’s ability to read Borges’ (and others’) movement and find him in dangerous areas is only going to lead to more scoring opportunities in 2024.

One final aspect of Borges’ game that remains underrated is his work rate without the ball. The Forge attacker regularly uses his elite ability to read the game to win possession for his side, and has already done so 15 times this season.

When Borges is deployed in a more free central role he can not only hunt the ball in more areas but also recover and win it back in critical zones on the pitch. This allows him to win the ball high up the pitch and create chances, to launch counter-attacking situations, or use his composure and dribbling ability to move the ball out of dangerous areas.

His best defensive attribute, as demonstrated by the clips above, is his ability to operate from behind players, finding the blind spots of opponents who are on the ball and using that to his advantage to dispossess them.

Next for Borges, and Forge for that matter, will be building on this outstanding start and showing he can once again maintain this level of quality over an entire season.

The Canadian Premier League is undoubtedly better when Borges is at his best, and that has certainly been the case to start 2024. In the league’s sixth season, he continues to be one of the league’s brightest stars.

All highlights courtesy of OneSoccer