Jason Hills
FC Edmonton Communications

EDMONTON — FC Edmonton knows the odds may be stacked against them each and every game, but they’re not going to back down to a challenge.
In fact, they plan to welcome it every single week.

It was evident in their season opener against Valour FC, which saw the team battle extreme wind conditions and they came through with a dramatic highlight reel goal in the 95th minute from Tobias Warschewski to earn a 1-1 draw.
Now tonight, they face York United FC (7 p.m. Clarke Stadium), a team they’ve yet to beat (0-4-4) in the first three seasons in the Canadian Premier League.
But the Eddies are showing they belong in the league and won’t be walked all over.

“If I took my team to go and play Bayern Munich, I would believe that we would get something out of that game. You have to go into every game that you play with belief,” said FC Edmonton head coach Alan Koch.
“I think players will always believe and I think coaches should always believe.”

The Eddies are by no means resting on their solid performance against Valour. They want to build on it, as they take on York, who has given FC Edmonton, plenty of challenges in their previous eight meetings.
And York, will no doubt be looking to avenge their season opening loss to the Halifax Wanderers last week.

“This is a new challenge and we’re the underdogs yet again,” said Koch.
“York have been together longer than us, they’ve had a longer pre-season and they also trained in B.C. and had a lot of (exhibition) games.”

The opposite could be said for FC Edmonton, who due to budget constraints had to stay home during their pre-season and had three pre-season games against the Vancouver Tigers, the University of Alberta Golden Bears and MacEwan Griffins.

“We’ve played against one professional team and that was our game last weekend. And win or lose, I wouldn’t be getting carried away,” said Koch.

“We’re underdogs again in this game and we’re going to embrace that, we’re going to embrace that every single week.”

The Eddies got several big contributions from many of their young players, many of which were playing in their first-career professional game.

Defender Cale Loughrey fit in nicely on the back end, and didn’t look out of place in his first pro game.
CJ Smith and Kairo Coore, who also saw action in their first professional game, and provided a big spark, and Smith helped set up the game-tying goal in injury time.
Wesley Timoteo substituted in the late stages of the game and made an incredible cross-pass on Warschewski’s goal.

FC Edmonton captain and midfielder Shamit Shome and defender Luke Singh, who brings experience from Toronto FC were a steady presence.
Forwards Azriel Gonzalez, Julian Ulbricht and Masta Kacher all looked dangerous at times throughout the first match.
Offensively, the team looks to have several weapons that Koch can utilize.

“I think everybody is aware we lost Easton (Ongaro) and he scored a lot of goals for this club, but I think collectively, our attacking group is better this year,” said Koch.
“I think Azriel, TBoy (Fayia), Kairo, Julian (Ulbricht), Masta (Kacher) we have six, even seven attacking threats up front.
“I don’t believe we have just one attacking piece, we have quite a few attacking pieces.”

While this youthful group of players may lack experience, Koch loves the energy they bring. Each of these players have an opportunity to make the most of their chance and make an impact.

“The fact our players are all young, they’re all hungry and motivated, we know from the start they’re going to give us everything they got,” said Koch.
“They’re not proven by any means, but they have potential, and we want to tap into that potential as much as we can.”