The Forward Press for Matchday 26 vs Valour FC: Dealing With Disappointment

Welcome to what will be a short and only half-sweet Forward Press, this week for that 3-all draw against Valour at the weekend. With not many questions, the answers have been provided in full to make up the content, with Diego Mejía and Manny Aparicio featuring in front of the press this time around. 

Mitchell Tierney of CanPL.ca started off the pre-match session by asking Mejía whether ATO would underestimate Valour:

“In this league you cannot underestimate any team … we need to try to put focus on our performance, to try to improve our model, and take with a lot of responsibility (in) the next match. We know that Valour is eliminated right now but they have really good players, a really good coach … They want to win the last three matches, so we need to focus on our behaviours.”

To close out what was a quick meeting, Ollie Platt of CanPL.ca asked Mejía if Ottawa were rounding into their best form near the end of the season:

“Yes, I think that we are playing really good football, I think that this team still has a lot of room to improve, because they are young players and I have the feeling that they have more to give”.

Coming out of the tunnel after the game, Mejía was harsh in his initial assessment of the dropped points:

“The result is not the (one) we expect(ed), to be honest we deserved to lose this game. We played the worst match (of) this year, so you cannot think (about) winning something playing this way. I think that we ha(d) a lot of luck to get this point.” 

He built upon his point in the follow up, which pertained to which aspect of the match he was most frustrated with:

“I think that it is normal for the age of this group, for a lot of young players that the emotion starts to control you, and you start to see the opportunity that you have, but you need to maintain composure, you need to put focus on the moment, you need to live (in) the present. You cannot win a match just by setting up on the beach. I think that we didn't play in the way that this team (has) played all this season, so that's the frustration. It's not just the opportunity to cut this (lead) between Forge and us, but it’s (also) for the waste … today we (didn’t deserve to win).”

A lot of breath was wasted after the match between fans who debated whether or not the last Valour goal was anyone in particular’s fault, or whether blame should even be assigned given the backline is so young, and inherently error-prone - or even if they should be given a pass considering their work up to this point. According to these answers, it is clear that Mejía expected better of them, given that for the entire season they have played up to par, or at least exceeded expectations, and that nobody on the pitch played as they should have. These are strong words from the coach, but ones that were deserved. 

Manny Aparicio followed Mejía, and he was asked the same question about the disappointment of the draw, but presented a little more optimistic than his coach:

“It's a tough one. We had the lead a couple times, we let it slip, obviously you finish the game feeling we dropped two points, but yeah we take the point, we’re still very tight to forge, and we still have two more games to play. Two more finals, and then playoffs, so we still have it in our hands, we still gotta perform. In this league at any moment anyone can beat anyone, I think this year we’ve been consistent, so we just gotta get back on track and keep on winning.”

He was then asked by club-representative Thomas Stockting about whether this will serve as a wake-up call for the team:

“Yeah for sure. It's been the same message since the beginning of the season, we have to give 90+ minutes to be able to get results. Every team is fighting for something, I know these guys, even (the) next game we play York, they’re (also) out of the playoffs, but these guys are playing for contracts, they're playing for pride, for their crest … We live and learn, we’ll learn from this, and we’ll get better.” 

A follow-up question from Stockting pertained to the lessons that the team will take from dropped points like this. Aparicio mentioned that they needed to anticipate teams being reckless, and pushing forward with nothing to lose, as there is nothing eliminated teams love more than playing spoiler. He was also insistent that not only do they need to absorb the lessons, but that they need to implement them in the coming matches to avoid all this talk from becoming just that, talk.

Finally, Aparicio was asked about resetting for the  next match:

“It's the most important thing right now. We can take today to kinda sulk about it, to think about it, to think what we could have done better, but tomorrow we flip the page and we look onwards to Vancouver, and then to the next game and the next game. It's what football is, and you look forward to it, and we’ll be ready for next game.” 

Although many fans will still feel disheartened after that match, there are still two more games left in the season, and the next one is Ottawa’s final home game before the playoffs! Be there at TD Place on Sunday, October 12th, at 3 PM, when ATO take on Vancouver FC in a bid to catch Forge for the title. Vamos!

About Alexander:

When he isn't busy playing or watching sports (or going to school at uOttawa), Alexander is managing his Atlético Ottawa database, which he started in 2020, and tracks everything you can think of about the club and its players. He also runs a BlueSky account dedicated to analyzing and rating CPL and NSL players using statistics, CPL by the Numbers.