by Matthew Lacy

VANCOUVER, WA— On a beautiful spring evening with clouds straight out of The Simpson’s intro, Vancouver Victory Football Club welcomed the North Idaho College Cardinals to the Hampton Inns Championship Field at the Harmony Sports Complex for a friendly where our Boys in Blue emerged victories with a 3-1 result. It was an uncommonly exciting game, being a friendly, and that was was by design.

Photos by Alan Moditz. See match gallery here.

“I want to press, press, press. Wings and our front three should be pretty high.” were the words of Head Coach Logan Emory and that is just what they did. The first half was dominated by our V2FC with over seven shots at goal, as compared to the Cardinal’s approximately two. There were solid pairings along the right line and the middle and the shots taken alluded to the fireworks to come.

Coach Emory stated, “We started with the three Warner [Pacific University] kids in the middle, which helps in terms of continuity. They know each other, just to have that moving forward I think helped a lot, it helped settle the game down. I think their relationship will be key for us at times.”

However, the score was still 0-0 at the half, but it did not take long for the Boys in Blue to change that. Fernando Ibanez capitalized on some well-earned space and launched a the ball from center-distance into the upper left of the net. 1-0.

The Cardinals were quick to answer on a penalty earned just outside the upper left of the box. In his all-black kit, the North Idaho player volleyed a screamer into the far right of the net, beating a diving Victory keeper. 1-1.

The second Victory goal came from Kingsly Armah, he sent a slow roller coming from far outside the right side of the box and it caught the North Idaho keeper off his line. 2-1. To cap it off, and again from center-distance, Nick Ballenger shot the ball straight into the lower left Cardinal net. 3-1.

At this point, the Cardinals kicked up their play into a higher gear, earning a yellow card at the top of the Victory box in the process. Coach Amory stated, “At the end of the game, the last 20 minutes or so, I think we could have done a better job controlling the game.” In spite of the extra efforts of the North Idaho men, the Victory were able to handle the onslot and emerge with a convincing result and a lot to be excited about.

Coach Emory was pleased. “It was good too see, it was good to control the game. I do think they are a good program, but I do not think the results should be shocking. It could have been a little bit more lopsided, I do not like to give up goals, especially that, I think that came from us and our sloppiness, but at the end of the day we know more about our team.”

He went on to say that, “There wasn’t a situation where there was any problems, which is always good to see, in a short pre-season you do not want to be solving problems; you want to be tinkering a little bit, what work in terms of chemistry and what the team is going to be all about rather than trying to take steps backwards.”

About his team, Coach Emory stated, “It’s tough as well, as I learn the guys and the league and who we are playing we do not want to read too much into that, but if we play that way, that’s what I want it to look like. So it’s not getting too far ahead of ourselves and being happy with the results.”

V2FC player Marco Gonzales echoed the coach saying, “It was a game I think we controlled a lot. We had a lot of space to play, it was very calm. It was a game where we just tried to play and tried to get to know each other and how everybody plays and so we just tried to play simple and most importantly we tried to play hard.”

If this is what we can expect from the Vancouver Victory Football Club in this 2018 season, it is going to be an exciting ride. Sea of Blue, get your season tickets now to catch all of the action. You can also follow the V2FC on Twitter and Facebook.

The Referee Squad:
Center: Chad Stewart
Line Ref: Julio Rivera
Line Ref: Roland Walkins