THE CANADIAN PRESS
EDMONTON — Michael Cox scored the first-ever goal for FC Edmonton on Wednesday as the team marked its professional soccer debut with a 3-0 exhibition victory over the Montreal Impact.
Cox etched his name in the club’s history book with his first of two on the night when he snuck a ball under Montreal ‘keeper Andrei Badescu in the 17th minute for Edmonton, which is set to join the North American Soccer League in 2011.
Edmonton went up 2-0 in the 60th minute on a header from former Vancouver Whitecap Paul Hamilton off a corner by Chris Lemire.
Facing an Impact team comprised almost entirely of backups, the new squad added a third goal just four minutes later when Sam Lam sent Cox through on a breakaway and he chipped his second of the game past Badescu.
For a team that won’t play its first official game in the NASL until next year, Edmonton has put together an exceptionally busy summer schedule. The team will play eight games in Edmonton this summer, including three against teams from outside North America.
The Montreal game was just the start of a rather hectic slate of tune-up matches for Edmonton, which includes a game against Chilean club team Colo-Colo on Sunday at Commonwealth Stadium.
Other matches this summer for FC Edmonton include Brazil’s Vitoria (June 27), the Ottawa Fury (July 6), England’s Portsmouth (July 21), the Victoria Highlanders (Aug. 11), the Spokane Spiders (Aug. 15) and NASL’s Miami FC (Aug. 28).
“It started off where we were just sort of going to get our team together lightly and in a slow manner and play a handful of exhibition games and go from there,” said FC Edmonton GM Mel Kowalchuk. “It has kind of snowballed since that, adding the three international matches. Once we got our coaches on board it has just became bigger and has taken off so fast. Faster than we were prepared for.”
Dwight Lodeweges, a member of the Edmonton Drillers soccer team from 1979 to ’82, has been hired as the team’s head coach. The team also hired assistant Hans Schriijver and technical coach Dave Randall.
The team’s roster includes veteran pro Dutch foursome of defender Sander Van Gessel, midfielder Paul Matthijs, goalkeeper Rein Baart and striker Ezra Schrijver.
Lodeweges hopes the ambitious summer schedule will give the team a leg up before it takes to the pitch for real in 2011.
The ambitious summer schedule a year out from actually joining the NASL should give FC Edmonton a big leg up when they take to the pitch for real in 2011.
“I think it shows that we have ownership (Tom and Dave Fath) that is here to stay and taking this seriously,” Lodeweges said. “Someone told me that the Baltimore (NASL) franchise just stepped right into the league and it hasn’t gone so well. We’re starting a year in advance.”
Soccer has had a tough go of it in Edmonton, with a number of teams that struggled to remain in existence, including the Drillers, the Black Gold, Eagles, Brickmen and the Edmonton Aviators, the most recent attempt at a pro franchise in 2004, which had to be taken over by the league partway through their first and only season.
But Kowalchuk feels that the sport has grown in profile in Canada and that the time is finally right.
“Ten years ago you could probably ask most people and especially kids around here to name some top players and favoured teams around the world and they would have been hard pressed,” Kowalchuk said. “Today there is so much soccer on television that almost everybody knows the major teams and a lot of the major players. There is a lot more excitement about soccer in general in this area than there used to be.
“The publicity and the exposure the sport is getting in Canada and North America is a lot greater than it used to be.”
FC Edmonton will join the NASL the same season the Vancouver Whitecaps join Major League Soccer. Montreal moves up the competitive ladder when it joins the MLS in 2012.