MONTRÉAL
Long after the rest of the place had spilled into the long, dark Montréal night, most of them morosely disappointed, a small burnt-orange brigade was still celebrating wildly on the pitch. They took turns hoisting a trophy far more important than people outside soccer can really grasp, jumping up and down in delirious unison, screaming thanks to the 100 or so supporters who’d made the trip from Steeltown to Stade Saputo.
Forge FC are Canadian Champions, the first CPL team to win the Voyageurs Cup, emblematic of national supremacy, and the first team not from Major League Soccer, which is ranked higher than the CPL in every soccer metric except heart—to win the Canadian Championship since it went to an upgraded tournament format 18 years ago.
They beat host, and somehow favoured, CF Montréal 2-1 in a rugged, tense match which was befitting of a national championship. The “2” part summarized the penalty kicks which had to be taken to decide the match and snap a 1-1 draw that took 90 minutes of regulation, 13 minutes of combined stoppage time and 30 minutes of ridiculously tense overtime.
In the end, Forge—never known for its penalty kicks, being on the wrong end the last four times they encountered it—got PK goals against Montréal keeper Sebastia Braza from Tristan Borges, Ben Paton, Dan Nimick and finally, the ultimate winner from Manjrekar James. That meant the home team didn’t even take its final shot because Hamilton’s dynamic keeper Dimitry Bertaud had made two diving stops, including his second of the game against Montréal superstar Prince Owusu.
Bertaud was voted the top player in the 15-team TELUS Canadian Championship, which began several months ago. He was simply outstanding all night.
“This is the first time I’ve won a trophy as a senior player,” said Bertaud, who signed with Forge this winter, looking to recalibrate his career after many years in France’s top and second divisions.
“Magnifique,” is how fellow French import Antoine Batisse described his teammate’s stellar play. Batisse, for whom this is also the first trophy as a senior player, had scored the game-opening goal just before the intermission. Montréal equalized early in the second half, then almost took the lead a minute later but was athletically repelled by Batisse, who had just returned from an international assignment with the Democratic Republic of Congo.
Make no mistake. This was one of the greatest nights in Hamilton sports history. And it came in a World Cup year, while also leaving the door open for Forge to become the first CPL team to turn the treble: Canadian title; regular-season champions; playoff champions.
It also left CF Montréal—a bitter, bitter rival after six straight years of facing Forge in the Nationals, and now losers to them the past three years—suddenly cheering for Hamilton to win at least one of the CPL trophies for which they’re still eligible. If that happens, the MLS team will earn a berth into Champions Cup, despite their otherwise horrid season.
“It’s astounding,” said Bob Young, the popular caretaker who financed Forge’s inception in 2018, prior to the CPL’s 2019 debut. “What this organization has done, they’re making us all so proud.
“And Hamilton is now Soccer Town Canada.”
A sentiment endorsed by Scott Mitchell, managing partner of Hamilton Sports Group, which owns the Forge and Ticats. Mitchell is also chairman of the CPL.
“I’m just thrilled for everybody, Bobby (Smyrniotis) and the whole team,” Mitchell said amidst the small ball of bedlam on the pitch after the game. “It’s been amazing for eight years. This is our eighth trophy in eight years, and I’m really thrilled for everybody in our league to have one of our teams win the big trophy, the domestic cup.
“An incredible night for Hamilton sports.”
Repeat one of the biggest wins in Hamilton sports history—perhaps the biggest, given soccer’s incredible reach.
While CF Montréal is in last place in the MLS East, they have quality players with international bona fides, and they had rested players in league games to be ready for this one. They were stung by a red card to Colombian defender Bryan Vera—essentially for ‘diving’ to earn his second yellow card—in the 55th minute but did an admirable job of managing their manpower shortage. Forge had some great chances and half-chances, most notably a couple of headers and Paton’s late blast off the crossbar, and there was some cosmic justice in them winning in penalty kicks, where they’d lost the 2020 final (played in 2022 because of the pandemic) to Toronto FC.
This might be a good time to mention that the Hammers were arguably without their three most skilled players: captain Kyle Bekker, who just retired and had been brilliant against Montréal as a Hammer; injured forward Nana Ampomah; and striker Lucas Cavallini, who was forced to depart early in this game when he hurt his right leg.
But they had lots of oomph to replace them, particularly a back line led by Manjrekar James and Dan Nimick, who spent most of the night pasted to a growingly frustrated Owusu. It was fitting that James scored the ultimate title winner after his debatable foul against Owusu in the box early in the match, necessitating Bertaud’s show-stopping saves on the shot and ensuing rebound.
“We keep on thinking about ways this team can get better year after year, and they’ve done it again,” Smyrniotis, the Greek soccer philosopher, beamed. “We’ve won trophies, we’ve won different things, obviously. And this tournament is something we’ve worked very hard at. We’ve been close before, and this is great for our club, great for the league, great for the city, great for soccer in this country.
“If you have these games that go to penalty kicks, it means we keep on putting ourselves in position to win... and these things will eventually go positive.”
Which they certainly did Wednesday night.
Montréal controlled play for the first 20 minutes before Forge began finding a field-stretching path down the right side. Eventually their pressure paid off with a goal in extra time of the opening frame. Noah Jensen, who has replaced Bekker at midfield and on the captain’s armband, has responded with superb play in recent weeks, and he delivered a perfect corner from the left side which Batisse headed in to give the Hammers a 1-0 lead into the intermission.
The home side ignited the larger-than-anticipated crowd (14,081) in the 49th minute when
Daniel Rios out-angled two Forge defenders for a perfect header to draw Montréal even.
The game was physical, tactical, verbally confrontational, exhausting and left soccer enthusiasts—especially those dressed in orange—thirsting for more.
Montréal, which upset four-time reigning Voyageurs Cup champion Vancouver Whitecaps, now plays out their MLS season, hoping to avoid a last-place finish.
The newly crowned national champion Forge—and how sweet does that sound?—still have two other trophy quests in play,
each with Champions Cup berths attached; by winning the CPL regular season, which ends Saturday, or winning the North Star Cup as playoff champions.
Or, as an elated Bekker put it: “Not bad for a little team from Hamilton, Ontario, eh?”