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Match Recap: FC London 4 - 0 North Mississauga Panthers

By League1 Ontario staff, 05/13/17, 8:00PM EDT

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FC London were rampant in front of a home crowd in Matchweek Three, ringing up a 4-0 win over North Mississauga Panthers after goals from Elvir Gigolaj (17'), Alberto Barquin (18', 75') and Bai Essa-Coker (83').

With two goals in the match, Barquin was happy with his performance, but particularly with the manner in which his team supported his play both in attack and defensive phases.

"We just kept to the tactics that our coach Dom [Kosic] asked for, just keeping calm, keeping the ball and letting the ball move into the spaces," he said. "I think we did that well." 

"We always look to play in central areas and get the ball back, so we always have a good shape to push forward and it is difficult for the other team to get out of that even in transition."


FC London (Photo: SGL247MEDIA/ FC LONDON)

Coming off a loss in their first match in Windsor, and a strong away win last week away to Pro Stars FC, North Miss appeared to struggle out the gate in their third away match in as many weeks. 

Head coach Sam Medeiros felt this side have showed mental difficulty in the early stages of these away matches, but have rebounded well, and did so again in the late stages of the match against London.

"I don't know happened, it seems to be away games," he said. "In the first game we played away to Windsor and we did the same thing. We came out very blah in the first half and then in the second half the players woke up, came out and started to play."

"Once the game starts, the coach no longer has control over what goes on within the four lines. It's up to the players, and unfortunately they woke up a little too late."

"Late in the game what we did was drop a forward into the middle and pushed our wingers very wide, so this is where we created a 4v2 against their back-line," he explained. "But it was a little bit too late. You have to wake up at the beginning of the game, and not in the second half."


North Mississauga Panthers (Photo: SGL247MEDIA/ FC LONDON)

London assistant coach Eduard Schmidt also commented on the effect that away matches can have, and was pleased with his team's response to the home support at the German Canadian Club in London.

"Today it was amazing to play in front of the supporters," he said. "The two games before, at TFC and then Sanjaxx, we didn't have the support but today with over a hundred people here, some singing and some atmosphere... this is positive about this club and we are happy to give them back a victory today."

Schmidt indicated that London had prepared a special game-plan for their home debut, with mixed results.

"We prepared something special today, overloading the central area with more players and we also had players from outside coming inside," he said. 

"At the same time we had a lot of players on their last line, and a number of players that could run behind their back-line to exploit space, especially next to their fullbacks. This worked perfectly for about fifteen minutes in the first half when we had many breakthroughs."

"At the end of the half we struggled a little bit to control the centre, and we were not happy with the display that we showed there. After the half you could see that we are not quite there yet physically, we could not control the game physically. This is also why we want to control the ball more. At the end we had a very good fifteen minutes where we just kept the ball. 

FC London next play Oakville Blue Devils on Friday May 19 at German Canadian Club, London.

North Miss next play TFC III on Saturday May 20 at Kia Training Ground.