Vancouver FC kept their playoff hopes alive on Saturday, Sept. 9, as they picked up a crucial 2-1 victory over Atlético Ottawa, thanks to a late James Cameron winner.
Vancouver took the lead after just six minutes, as Mikaël Cantave slotted home on a breakaway to make it 1-0.
Their lead wouldn’t last very long, however, as Ottawa’s Ollie Bassett responded around 10 minutes later, pouncing on a Callum Irving turnover and slotting home into an empty net to tie the game up at one.
From there, however, that would set up a cinematic finish, one that Cameron fittingly provided in the 91st minute, as he slotted home his first professional goal to give his team all three points on the night.
“It’s very special,” Vancouver’s head coach, Afshin Ghotbi, said of the win. “Because it’s not only just three points, but the fact that we did it against a very quality team in Ottawa, so I think is a great result for the whole football club, and it will give us an enormous amount of confidence and energy going forward.”
“It gives us confidence,” Cantave, named player of the match, said. “It proves to us that what we’re doing is working and that we’re moving in the right direction. I know losing against Forge wasn’t the result that we’d hoped for, we’d put in a good shift and our stats were good that day, so we looked to build off of that.”
“Our staff doesn’t give up, our ownership hasn’t given up, our players haven’t given up, and I think today shows that.”
Cameron’s moment comes a few weeks after he got benched after a poor reaction following his substitution from a clash against Pacific in which he had struggled, leaving the 18-year-old to miss out on the squad altogether the next week against York, before seeing the field for just 18 minutes the week after against Forge.
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Next, Vancouver will travel to Alberta to take on league leaders, Calgary Cavalry, at ATCO Field on Saturday, Sept. 16th at 2 p.m.
