Final Score: Atlético Ottawa 0-0 Vancouver FC
Goalscorers: None
Game of the 2024 season: 110
CPL match: 594
Match in a minute or less
Atlético Ottawa and Vancouver FC were unable to solve one another on Saturday night at TD Place, as the two sides battled to a 0-0 draw in the final duel of the 2024 Canadian Premier League regular season in The Outcome! presented by TonyBet.
Ottawa had a first-half goal chalked off for offside, and that was the only time the ball hit the back of the net in this match as a flurry of chances at both ends ultimately went unfinished.
As a result of the draw, Atleti finished the regular season in third place, while Vancouver miss out on the playoffs as the league’s seventh-place side.
Three Observations
Atlético Ottawa unable to climb to second, will return home to host quarter-final next weekend
Ottawa came into Saturday’s season finale knowing that they needed things to go right for them elsewhere for them to finish second. So, perhaps it takes some of the sting away that Cavalry FC’s win over Valour FC meant Atleti were locked into third place regardless of their result.
However, the home side were nonetheless a frustrated bunch at full time. If they had beaten Vancouver, and Cavalry had dropped points in Winnipeg, Ottawa would have come second and would’ve played Forge FC in next Sunday’s qualifying semi-final for a chance to host the CPL Final.
The final record this year for Atleti sits at 11 wins, 11 draws and six defeats, for 44 points — an eight-point improvement on last season, and five points behind the club’s best ever (their regular season title in 2022).
As a result, Ottawa will play their sole home playoff match next Sunday, Oct. 7 at 1 p.m. ET. Their advantage will be the full week’s rest, when they take on the winner of Wednesday night’s play-in game between York United and Pacific FC in Toronto.
If they win that, they’ll travel the following weekend to play whichever of Forge and Cavalry loses the qualifying semi-final.
Ottawa would’ve liked to go into the playoffs on a win — especially if it had gotten them into second place — but they nonetheless enter the postseason as a team that’s well-prepared for knockout football. Atleti lost just one of their last 10 games of the season, with four clean sheets in there, which means they’re set up well for the thin margins of the playoffs.
“From now on, we have to look forward,” head coach Carlos González said postmatch. “We are a team that is going to be tough to beat. We’re feeling a good moment of confidence, I feel like the players are feeling that we’re a very solid team that’s not going to show fragility in any moments of games. I think that’s a good base to be a good team and a contender in a playoff structure.”
One final thing to note for Atlético Ottawa from this last regular season game was the bittersweet moment for captain Maxim Tissot, who was honoured prematch as he’ll be retiring at the end of this season.
Tissot, who has made almost 100 appearances for CPL clubs (over two years with Atleti and two with Forge) and has 13 men’s national team caps, would love for next Sunday not to be his final game. He’s won the CPL championship once before, but the Gatineau native wants to go out on a high with his hometown club.
The next week will be a tricky one to manage for Atleti. They won’t know their playoff opponent until Wednesday night, but González said he doesn’t mind that, as he usually doesn’t turn the focus of his preparation to the opposition until later in the week anyway.
After a little bit of rest for his players, González will have his side hard at work soon.
“We usually prepare the weeks like that,” he said. “The first days of the week focused on us, what can we improve, what can we maintain from the last games, and the last few days are when we start to do the game plan depending on the opponents.”
Ottawa’s path to the North Star Cup requires them to win three consecutive games, beginning next Sunday on home turf.
Vancouver’s season comes to a close despite spirited fight to the end
They were alive until the very end, but Vancouver FC’s 2024 campaign is over. For them to make they playoffs, they needed a win in Ottawa, and they also needed Pacific to drop points against Forge — which they did not, beating the Hamilton club 1-0.
In the club’s second year in existence, they did show improvement, although their 7-9-12 record gave them just one more point than 2023.
Now, they head into an interesting off-season, where the club has a lot to consider after making major changes to the squad prior to this campaign.
Head coach Afshin Ghotbi said postmatch that it’ll take some time to assess what exactly he thinks his team needs, and whether they’ll address that from within or in the transfer market, but he did identify that he’d like to bring in an experienced central defender, as well as find a way to get more goals from the number 10 position.
Above all though, Ghotbi said that the kids will continue to be the future at Vancouver FC, after another year where the club was near the top of the CPL in U-21 minutes.
“First and foremost we have to take a deep breath and do a deep analysis of all the performances, and then strategically decide the direction we want to go as a football club,” Ghotbi said. “We want to be the football factory, we want to be the club that not only identifies young local players but develops them. We’ve already taken a step by building an under-19 team, we want to build a bigger pool of squads and selection, so we can bring players at younger ages into our organization, give them the training, give them the education so once they come into the first team they’re more prepared, they can perform and help us get results.”
Meanwhile, captain Callum Irving — who set a new CPL record on Saturday for the most saves in a single season, with 95 — expressed his pride in VFC’s push toward the end of the season, adding that he feels the lessons learned from this year’s race will serve them well down the line.
“We tried to make a real push in the last four games of the season, and I thought in these last four games there was a different mentality and a focus,” he said. “Despite the fact we didn’t make the playoffs I’m still proud of the effort they showed at this crucial moment.”
Irving added: “For a lot of the guys it’s just experience gained. A good chunk of people haven’t been in a fight for the playoffs at this point in their careers, so I think at any point when you get those pressure games and you can put those in your back pocket and move forward with that experience, you become better for it.”
Two sides neutralize each other in draw despite chances at both ends
As far as scoreless draws go, this was a reasonably eventful one. Atlético Ottawa thought they’d scored just 15 minutes in, but Manny Aparicio’s position in front of Callum Irving meant it was disallowed for offside. Vancouver had a flurry of set-piece opportunities toward the end of the first half.
And the final 10 minutes were entertaining, with a combined eight shots between the two sides after the 80th minute. Vancouver spent an extended stretch buzzing around the penalty area, and then with the final touch of the ball, Ottawa’s Rubén del Campo was at the head of a counter-attack and in on goal alone — but the four minutes of stoppage time had elapsed, and the referee blew for full-time before Del Campo could challenge the keeper.
Although it wouldn’t ultimately have mattered for the standings if either side had scored, the beauty of playing all four games simultaneously on Saturday was that neither Ottawa nor Vancouver knew that — which made for a back-and-forth, frantic closing chapter.
“I’m very proud of the performance,” Ghotbi said of Vancouver’s output on Saturday. “I think it’s one of the best team performances we’ve had all season. What was missing was the goal; we were looking for it, and in every stage we tried to add more attacking players hoping we could win the game and score the goal. But even when we started playing open, the way we defended in big spaces, getting caught in one-versus-one situations, the defenders did exceptionally well. But this has been a little bit our problem all season; when we’re scoring goals, we couldn’t get the defending part correctly, and then vice versa as we got to the later stage of the season. We have only ourselves to blame, and learn from our errors. We put ourselves in this position.”
Meanwhile, González agreed that his side had defended well too, but didn’t quite have the attacking impetus needed to crack Vancouver in the final stages.
Due to the nature of the match, with both sides throwing all they could at the other, it was a little disjointed, which made for an entertaining pace but maybe wasn’t the controlled tempo González might’ve wanted.
“The second half, it’s difficult to take conclusions because it was very emotional,” he said. “They played with nothing to lose, we also played with nothing to lose, and in certain moments the game went out of control — a lot of craziness, it could’ve gone to their side or to our side. But I think we can be proud of the mentality of the players, the hunger of the players.”
Now, all that’s left on the CPL schedule is more do-or-die football. If Saturday’s action is anything to go by, the playoffs should be quite the spectacle.
CanPL.ca Player of the Match
Vasco Fry, Vancouver FC
The VFC midfielder caused all sorts of problems for Atlético, winning possession 14 times, making three tackles and winning seven duels. With the ball, he created two chances and led his side with 76 touches and 39 completed passes, also taking two shots of his own.
What’s next?
Atlético Ottawa’s playoff journey begins with a quarter-final on Sunday, Oct. 27 at TD Place (1 p.m. ET), where they’ll play the winner of Wednesday night’s game between York United and Pacific FC. Meanwhile, Vancouver FC’s 2024 season has come to an end, as they now look ahead to 2025.
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