Vancouver FC will be looking to add some experienced players to the team roster during the off-season after just missing the league playoffs in their second year.
A post-season question and answer session with top players, team president Rob Friend and head coach Afshin Ghotbi at the team's Langley offices on Tuesday, Oct 29 spent most of the afternoon discussing how a promising start by the newest team in the Canadian Premier League (CPL) finished the way it did, with a series of close games ending just out of the finals.
Vancouver FC centre-back Rocco Romeo described it as "the dip."
"I'm still trying to figure out what happened, honestly," Romeo remarked.
"We're all just gutted."
Team captain Callum Irving, who is up for this year’s Golden Glove award for best goalkeeper during the 2024 regular season, was a big reason why the games were close.
"Everyone had a fire in their belly," Irving declared.
Irving thinks the team got a little "too high" at the beginning of the season, then "maybe too low" when it fell behind.
Attacker Gaby Bitar said the team did its best, but sometimes luck wasn't with them – "a lot of times it just didn't go for us."
"We went out and gave it our all," Bitar commented.
"We really pushed ourselves to the best of our abilities."
Team president Rob Friend and coach Afshin Ghotbi told the Q&A the team will be looking to add players with playoff experience, while continuing to look for young, local talent to develop as well.
"We need guys in the locker room who have played in championships," Friend observed.
Ghotbi said the team was looking for "winners."
"We need to find players who have achieved great things," Ghotbi summarized.
At the end of the season, the top and bottom ranked teams were close, the coach said.
"That gap, we're going to close it and we're going to close it quickly," Ghotbi predicted.
A few days earlier, during a one-on-one interview with the Langley Advance Times, Friend called the team a work in progress, "still [in] a development phase," after a chaotic start in their first year.
"We improved a lot from the game day to the on-field product and obviously off-field, really trying to establish ourselves in the community," Friend said. "But this is still a long-term project that still needs a lot of work and love and nurturing."
"We launched this club very quickly," Friend remarked.
"In hindsight, we probably should have waited another year to really build a fan base and an awareness campaign," Friend said, but he was encouraged by the progress that has been made.
"There's definitely traction. There's more awareness. Everyone who comes to games loves it, loves the product. And we know that we can continue to evolve and improve."
Improvements to the stadium are on his to-do list.
"When you talk about a work in progress, it's the same with our stadium," Friend observed, adding the team will be looking to upgrade the facility.
"It needs more permanent amenities, bathrooms, concessions, but we're confident that we're going to get there quite quickly," Friend said.
"We're working closely with the Township of Langley and the Langley Events Centre to invest in the stadium to offer a more premium product."
"I would also say this – the stadium is somewhat underutilized. You know, you've got our 15, 16 home games, but I'd love to see more concerts, more sporting events. I think really this can be a huge sports and entertainment component to this region. But it needs some finishing touches."
While he was disappointed at missing the playoffs, Friend said the team had a "lot of positives to reflect on, including our demonstrated competitiveness with top teams in the CPL, the historic milestones we achieved this year on the pitch, the exciting development of young players and the thrilling skills and technique of our veterans. These are all solid, foundational aspects from this year that we know we will continue to build upon in the future."