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Shaan Hundal scored Valour's goal in Sunday's 2-1 loss to Vancouver FC -- photos by Cameron Bartlett
Match Report | Valour FC 1 Vancouver FC 2
August 25, 2024
Ed Tait
by
Ed Tait

Valour FC’s slow climb into a potential Canadian Premier League playoff spot has been met with an untimely and unfortunate slip.

Actually, let’s be a bit more blunt here: Sunday’s crushing 2-1 loss to Vancouver FC in front of 3,099 at a scorching Princess Auto Stadium came with a thrilling finale that featured both elation and absolute heartache for the home side.

Trailing 1-0 at halftime, Valour evened the score with a Shaan Hundal marker in the 87th minute with Vancouver down a man, and then had a breakdown at a critical moment in extra time, conceding the winner in the 97th minute.

As a result, Valour not only whiffed on a chance to pull into a tie with Vancouver for the fifth and final playoff spot — or at least keep the gap at three points with a draw — but instead has now fallen behind by six points. Valour, down to eight matches remaining in the regular season, will head to Calgary for a match with Cavalry FC next Friday and will then finish with five of their final seven at home.

“The whole locker room is pretty down right now — that’s normal after losing the way we did,” said Hundal in his post-match media conference. “We feel like we could have got at least one point, especially when they went a man down. We deserved more of the game and I think I could have had two or three goals on a different day — I missed a header, back-post (chance) if I was ready for it.

“The whole message is we’ve got eight more games and they way this league goes teams are going to drop points and if we can pick up more points than they drop we can come back in and maybe make the playoffs.

“We’ve got to move past this loss quickly. Everyone knows how important this game would have been for the standings but the biggest thing is to not take this too heavy on ourselves. If we keep doing what we’ve been doing the last five or six games, we’re heading in the right direction. If we can keep this form up and even sharpen it a little bit more and get on better form we can move up quicker than we think.”

Valour generated 19 shots, six on target and enjoyed better possession and expected goal numbers than the visitors. After falling behind 1-nil in the first half, Hundal evened the score on a dogged effort in the box after some solid work by Abdul Binate, Noah Verhoeven and Loic Kwemi led to his chance.

Then pressing for the winner with Vancouver down a man for the final 22 minutes plus extra time, Valour ultimately paid for their lack of finish when Ayman Sellouf snuck the winner home past Jonathan Viscosi in the 97th minute.

What’s massive now for Valour is to get up off the mat after the crushing loss and get into full chase mode again.

“It’s just one of those days in football we need to deal with and cope with that are going to be disappointing,” said Valour GM and head coach Phillip Dos Santos. “I told the guys before the game we cannot make this match a defining match — it’s an important match, there’s three points up for grabs — but it cannot define a season.

“… Some choose to let their disappointment become frustration. I’m not that type. I’ve been in this long enough to know unfortunately it’s one of those games that didn’t go our way in a very bizarre way at a point in time where if there was team that should’ve grabbed three points it would have been us.

“We have two choices now,” he added. “We let this take a lot of our energy or just mourn for 12 hours and be back here fighting, training, knowing that the season’s not done and we’re not dead and that we’re still very much in the fight.”

‘V’ NOTES
-Valour was without arguably their best player as fullback Themi Antonoglou served a yellow-card accumulation suspension. He will be back for Friday’s match against Cavalry.
-Versatile midfielder/defender Dante Campbell — who started along the back line in Antonoglou’s absence — picked up his eighth yellow of the season and will not be available on Friday.

Valour FC 1 Vancouver FC 2

Goals
Valour FC
86:35′: Shaan Hundal
Vancouver FC
29:05′: Gabriel Bitave (assist: Mikael Cantave)
96:13′: Ayman Sellouf (assist: Matteo Campagna)

Card summary
Valour FC
46:48’: Dante Campbell (yellow, tactical foul)
63:53′: Jordi Swibel (yellow, reckless offence)
Vancouver FC
18:52’: James Cameron (yellow, tactical foul)
68:47′: James Cameron (second yellow, tactical foul=red)

VALOUR STARTING XI (4-2-3-1)
GK – Jonathan Viscosi
D – Roberto Alarcon
D – Frankie Facchineri
D – Tass Mourdoukoutas
D – Dante Campbell
MF – Raphael Ohin ©
MF – Safwane Mlah
FW – Diogo Dias Da Ressureicao
FW – Jordan Faria
FW – Noah Verhoeven
F – Jordi Swibel

Valour substitutions
66:39’: On Abdul Binate; off Jordi Swibel
66:46′: On Jordan Haynes; off Safwane Mlah
67:01′: On Noah Verhoeven; off Raphael Ohin
82:16′: On Loic Kwemi; off Jordan Faria