Eddies To Unveil Head Coach Tomorrow

Canadian Premier League side FC Edmonton will be unveiling its new head coach tomorrow.

The announcement is scheduled to come at 1:00PM EST (11:00AM MT), at which point the club will reveal its fifth-ever head coach via an official press conference.

The club has been without a gaffer since Jeff Paulus stepped down on September 21 following a winless campaign at The Island Games. Since then, change has been the theme at Clarke Stadium: the owners brought in a new Club President and General Manager in Eric Newendorp, who has spent the last few weeks interviewing a multitude of candidates for the vacant head coach post.

OneSoccer Analyst Oliver Platt has tipped former FC Cincinatti and Colorado Springs head coach Alan Koch as a lead candidate, with the 45-year-old South African gaffer having left the Switchbacks for personal reasons last week.

It wouldn’t be his first foray into Canadian soccer, with Koch having led Simon Fraser University to a 83.33% win record under his tenure before he join the Vancouver Whitecaps as a scout. He was later named the first-ever head coach of the Whitecaps 2 in 2015, where he gave Alphonso Davies his first taste of professional minutes. Given his eye for young talent, he’d be a smart hire for a club which has such deep roots in its own academy system.

Whoever is ultimately named tomorrow, Newendorp revealed that he expects the incoming gaffer to bring in some of his own technical staff, which means that the club’s expected turnover isn’t limited to just those who play on the pitch.

The Club President also revealed that it would be announcing its season ticket membership options in the wake of the announcement, with Newendorp explaining that it was the kind of managerial hire that will likely entice fans to buy into the club’s upcoming season and beyond.

To that end, Newendorp has rational expectations for the next five years: he’d like to see FC Edmonton collect at least one North Star Shield within that time frame, but he knows that the near term future is all about rebuilding from a stable platform.

Former head coach Colin Miller revealed that he had not been approached for the position, while highly-touted Capers boss Deano Morley revealed the same after the rumour mill put his name in circulation.

The club has already re-signed a trio of young academy products in Marcos Velado-Tsegaye, Antony Caceres, and Chance Carter, while the CanPL Editorial team states that Easton Ongario and Jeannot Esua have signed on for 2021 as well. Given that Raul Tito stated he was on loan with plans to arrive in Canada afterwards, one imagines that his contract is set for the upcoming year, too.

Beyond that, however, it seems that there will be plenty of turnover to accompany the new gaffer. With the announcement scheduled for tomorrow morning, fans don’t have to wait too much longer to find out who it is.