For York United fans, Friday night’s barren draw at Starlight Stadium against in-form Canadian Premier League leaders Pacific United felt like a win. This was the first installment of the double-header with the rematch on Tuesday at the same venue but this time in the Canadian Championship.

The Nine Stripes produced a decent performance with plenty of gusto and effort to split points at a difficult ground. They surrendered ball possession 43% to James Merriman’s side but outshot the Tridents [13 shots to Pacific’s 10]. It was at times fast-paced and frenetic as a solid defensive display by Martin Nash’s men kept the high scoring Pacific at bay.

‘’They've been a top team in the league. They've been fantastic this year, especially at home, they're unbelievable at home and you know, I'm extremely pleased with the clean sheet because it's not easy to come here and stop that offense [some talented players] from scoring,’’ said Nash in his post-match conference.

‘But I think, teams were really physical, both teams wanted to win and they battled it out.

‘So it's good to see tough, competitive matches and it was kind of on the edge a little bit, but you saw two teams that really wanted to win.’’

One of the positives on the night, for York, was the performance of stand-in captain Dominick Zator. His timely block in the first half to deny Alejandro Diaz from scoring inside the box was chosen as Moment of the Match by the TV broadcasters OneSoccer.

Zator, the centre back, had 11 clearances, two interceptions, seven ball recoveries and won five out of 8 duels [Ground and Aerial]. Before the half-time whistle, Pacific lost three players to injury and in total gave away 16 fouls and picked up three bookings.

On the other hand, York United gave away 15 fouls and were booked once.

“We didn’t give them too much time and space,” Nash added. “We (knew that) we had to close them down, you’ve got to as they have so many talented players on the pitch, they’re such a good football team. You can’t give them time and space.

“And I thought we limited their time and space, which was big. We forced them to play negatively, and they couldn’t, they weren’t really finding the solution to get forward comfortably, so that was a bonus, and I think it was something that really helped us keep the clean sheet.”

Nash also had concerns with our low conversion rate after failing to hit the target in the 13 shots fired.

The Gaffer admitted his side needed to work on their attack but explained the constant tweaking of his starting line-ups due to the overwhelming injuries is accounting for their sterility.

He said: ‘We get into those areas a lot and it's matching the quality with the runs and we just we keep working on it and and trying to get that connection right.

We've been working on it every week so it's getting better but it's a little bit inconsistent.

‘The thing is, as well as we've had to change lineups a lot, the connections generally are there. You see moments where guys just aren't on the same wavelength is because we haven't had a run where we can play consistently the same players.’’

Ahead of the match, it was leaked that first choice goalkeeper Niko Giantsopoulos will be joining MLS side Vancouver Whitecaps for some few days on an emergency loan.

He kept his composure and produced a clean-sheet performance after making three saves.

‘Yeah, it can be tough to keep focused when you get that kind of news a couple of hours before kickoff but he's got a great mentality,’’ Nash praised his shot-stopper.

‘He’s a great guy and he didn't let this focus shift from our game and I thought he was brilliant tonight and commanded his box, claimed what he needed to claim and was very good.

‘It was good on him to to be able to stay focused and and do the job he needed to for the team tonight.’’

Giantsopoulos is expected to rejoin his teammates on Monday in Langford for Tuesday’s match in the Voyageurs Cup.

Ibrahim Ridwan Asante

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