When striker Moses Dyer was acquired by Pacific FC this week, he automatically became the team’s leading scorer with four goals on the season with Vancouver FC.
It shows why he has earned 11 caps for the New Zealand national team after representing the nation in the 2017 FIFA Under-20 World Cup.
Dyer represents the sort of offensive dynamism that has been glaringly absent from the Tridents’ attack this season, as PFC has won only twice in the last 14 Canadian Premier League games and is the lowest-scoring team in the league by a wide margin of eight goals.
It is hoped the insertion of Dyer into the line-up today at 2 p.m. PDT in Calgary against Cavalry FC will end the freefall.
“Moses is very aggressive going forward with good speed and good power. He’s very direct,” said PFC head coach James Merriman.
“The one thing we’ve had a problem through this difficult time is that we are controlling games at times and good on ball possession. But there’s no punch in the end in the box and no killer in front of goal. That’s what [Dyer] does. He has eyes to go forward in attack and go to the goal. He adds that to our attack and that will push our other forwards.”
Striker Ayman Sellouf went from PFC to Vancouver FC and Dyer came from VFC to PFC, both on loan to the end of the season, in hopes of re-charging their personal seasons and the seasons of their new teams.
“It’s been a very challenging period for us in terms of results. We’ve had some disappointing games,” said Merriman.
“We’ve had hard conversations, that are always going to be had, but nobody is feeling sorry for themselves. We have a clear plan on how we want to attack the final third of the season and it starts in Calgary. It’s important we keep perspective and accept the position we are in and accept what we are fighting for over the last third of the season.”
That is to slip into the playoffs.
“I can promise you we are not going to stop,” said Merriman.
The room remains optimistic, the PFC bench-boss added: “Nobody’s head is down, that’s not the case. We know we’ve been challenged. This is adversity and we need to deal with it and accept we have 10 matches left to fight and get into fifth place [last playoff position]. If we can do that and push ourselves into the playoffs, we can be very dangerous. That needs to be the focus and we can’t let any other noise affect us.”
The Tridents meet the Vancouver Whitecaps of Major League Soccer on Tuesday at B.C. Place in the back end of their two-game, total goal Canadian Championship semifinal set, with the Caps’ leading 1-0 following their win last month at a packed Starlight Stadium.
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