The score in the Canadian Championship quarterfinal game was 0-0 at halftime, but a missed call for a penalty kick hurt CS Saint-Laurent’s chances.
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The final score doesn’t tell the full story.
CS Saint-Laurent — a semi-pro team — was beaten 3-0 by Toronto FC of Major League Soccer Wednesday night in front of 6,482 fans at Complexe sportif Claude-Robillard in the first leg of their Canadian Championship quarterfinal series.
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A 3-0 score in soccer suggests a blowout, but this game wasn’t — especially when you factor in the difference in talent level on both sides.
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Saint-Laurent qualified for the Canadian championship by winning the Ligue 1 Quebec championship. Only some of the players on the team earn a small salary while holding down other jobs and/or going to school, while Toronto had a player payroll of more than US$25 million last year.
At halftime, the score in this David vs. Goliath battle was 0-0.
Saint-Laurent didn’t just sit back and defend, as both teams had a number of good scoring chances in the first half and the shot attempts were 10-9 in favour of Toronto.
It was Saint-Laurent that had the first good chance early in the second half, but Matthew Ben Longstaff opened the scoring for Toronto in the 50th minute. Three minutes later, Saint Laurent’s Loïc Kwemi had a good chance from in close to tie the score, but Toronto goalkeeper Luka Gavran made the stop.
In the 58th minute, the referee missed what looked like an obvious hand ball by Toronto centre-back Aimé Mabika in the box that would have resulted in a penalty kick for Saint-Laurent. Instead, Toronto quickly took advantage of a long ball going the other way and only 11 seconds after the missed call Deandre Kerr scored to make it 2-0. Federico Bernardeschi completed the scoring in the 76th minute off a free kick.
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The second leg of this two-game, aggregate-goals series will be May 21 in Toronto.
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The missed call for a hand ball was definitely the turning point in the first leg. Instead of the score possibly being tied 1-1 after a penalty kick, with momentum going back to Saint-Laurent and with their fans behind them, it was 2-0.
“Those are moments that change games,” Saint-Laurent coach Nicholas Razzaghi said. “At the end of the day, it is what it is. It’s frustrating because of the aftermath of that. That’s our job. That’s the difference between the pros and us. Sometimes those little details don’t go your way and we have to be able to handle that. But yes, we for sure feel hard-done by that call.”
Razzaghi was proud of the effort his players put in and said that fatigue did catch up to them in the second half.
“For sure, it gets tough to concentrate when you’re not used to this level of fitness and physique and just quality on the ball,” he said. “It tires your mind if not more than your legs. For sure it’s tough out there, but I’m very proud of the effort they put in because they worked very, very hard and they didn’t come into this challenge scared. They came into this challenge with a lot of confidence and courage.”
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Toronto coach John Herdman was impressed by the Saint-Laurent team, which advanced to the quarterfinals with a 3-2 penalty-kicks road victory over the Halifax Wanderers of the professional Canadian Premier League.
“We expected them to have an open game,” Herdman said. “They had a very deliberate style and that deliberate style involved really utilizing their strengths. The coaching staff did a great job.
“Hat’s off to them,” Herdman added. “Great job by their coaching team. They can hold their heads up.”
scowan@postmedia.com
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