Atletico Ottawa remains atop the Canadian Premier League with a 7-4-1 record (25 points) after an intense, but scoreless draw in Toronto against York United. The intense humidity and temperatures exceeding 35 degrees heavily affected the match and made it difficult for either team to sustain their energy and play at full-strength for 90 minutes.
Ottawa remains two points clear of Forge FC and four points clear of Cavalry and Halifax Wanderers. But Forge and Cavalry both have a game in hand over Ottawa.
This game is a true tale of two halves. In the first half, York United was the dominant team, controlling the possession and generating more quality chances. York outshot Ottawa 4-2 (2-0 on target), created one big chance to Ottawa’s zero, handily won the xG battle 0.44-0.05, and limited Ottawa to only one touch in their penalty area. York had seven touches in Ottawa’s box and accumulated 22 final third entries to Ottawa’s 17.
Their defense suffocated Ottawa’s electric, potent, and creative attack. They constantly had multiple defenders marking the ball carrier, in an attempt to force him to act rashly and make an error. They also pressed extremely well high up the pitch, eliminating Ottawa’s passing and shooting lanes and putting pressure on Ottawa when they tried to play out from the back. Particularly, York did a great job tracking David Rodriguez and Sam Salter –who lead the CPL assist and goals chart, with five and eight, respectively– limiting their ability to get into open spaces to generate chances.
In the second half, it was a different story, and the momentum began to tilt in Ottawa’s favour. Ottawa outshot York 9-1 in the second half (3-0 on target), created one big chance to York’s zero, and won the xG battle 0.34 to 0.03.
“Fair play to both teams, they came and did what they had to do, but it’s tough. It’s extremely tough. … I think we can talk about a game that had a half for both teams. First half, we were better, we created some chances, and they were better than us in the second half and had a little bit more possession,” York head coach Mauro Eustáquio said post-game.
Both Ottawa and York had quality offensive spells in the match, but simply lacked a clinical edge and didn’t consistently create enough quality scoring chances as a result of the slow-paced, stop-start nature of the contest. This particularly affected Ottawa, who weren’t able to haunt their opponents with their speed, creativity, offensive flair, and aggressive overlapping play on the wings, which opens up opposing defenses.
However, under head coach Diego Mejia, Ottawa has shown they can play multiple different styles and get results in multiple different ways. Ottawa defended resolutely all match long, withstanding York’s front-footed assault in the first half before completely negating York’s attack in the second half, limiting them to only one measly shot attempt and 0.03 xG.
Ottawa focused on possession, control, and smart, careful ball movement to see out a difficult draw and earn a huge point. Atletico finished with over 65 percent possession and had a 94 percent completion rate on a team-high 634 passes, which showed how meticulous Ottawa were with the ball all over the pitch. They focused on making the safest, easiest, and most effective pass available instead of making back-line breaking passes to beat defenders with their speed, like they normally do.
According to the CPL website, 10 of the 16 players who made an appearance for Ottawa had an individual passing accuracy above 90 per cent; Noah Abatneh alone completed 103 of the 104 passes he attempted 104 passes.
Moving the ball carefully around the pitch helped Ottawa control the match’s pace and tempo while simultaneously trying to move York players out of position, allowing Atleti to look for holes to expose in York’s defensive structure. Playing keep away also ensured York spent less time with the ball at their feet in Ottawa’s defensive third, which took the pressure off Nate Ingham and Ottawa’s backline.
“Our best defence is trying to play the whole match on the ball,” Diego Mejía explained in the post-match press conference. “The numbers don’t lie, this is our best defence. If you have the players that we have in defence, if you have the best goalkeeper in the league, if you have some of the best centre-backs in the league, you don’t suffer a lot.”
“It was hard to keep a high rhythm in terms of running around and pressing, so I thought we handled it well. We were able to move the ball well and tire them out. It was unlucky that we couldn’t score at least one goal, but I’m happy we could keep the clean sheet,” Ottawa defender Noah Abatneh said in the post-match press conference.
In the first nine matches of the season, Ottawa focused mainly on playing free-flowing attacking football and handily outscoring their opponents. As a result, they made some defensive lapses and were unable to keep a clean sheet. Since they outscored everyone else in the league by such a wide margin, the defensive errors didn’t make the biggest of impacts.
Now, they have kept three consecutive clean sheets (1-0 away win against Pacific, 3-0 home win against Valour, and a 0-0 away draw against York) and they’re playing resolute, compact, organized defensive football with a young core, particularly three outstanding U-21 players: Noah Abatneh (20), Sergei Kozlovskiy (17) and Joaquim Coulanges (18). Loic Cloutier also just turned 21 in April. That is simply incredible and is a testament to the players’ abilities, Mejia’s ability to shift between multiple different tactics and formations, and the scouting network for finding these incredible players.
Next up for Ottawa: a trip to Calgary to play Cavalry FC on June 28.
York United, who sit in fifth place in the league with a 4-2-6 record (14 points), travel to Hamilton to play red-hot Forge FC on June 29, so their schedule doesn’t get any easier anytime soon.
Before today, York and Ottawa had met twice already this season. Ottawa won their first league meeting 3-2 and the first leg of the Canadian Championship quarterfinals 2-1, both at TD Place. Games between York and Atletico are normally high-flying offensive thrillers with goals galore.
We’ll have another chance to see a high-scoring offensive affair when these two sides meet in the second leg of the Can Champ QF on July 8 at York Lions Stadium.
