While most Canadians abroad spent the past week hibernating – with their clubs either out of season or on winter break – a pair of former Toronto FC Academy teammates continued putting their stamp on the European game.
Dylan Carreiro scored for Queens Park Rangers’ U-21 side on Tuesday, as they drew 3-3 in a friendly against Southend United. The exhibition match also gave 19-year-old Carreiro a chance to line up alongside veterans Shaun Wright-Phillips and Bobby Zamora, who also scored for QPR.
Carreiro’s erstwhile QPR and former Toronto Academy teammate, Michael Petrasso, once again made an impact for Oldham Athletic, where he is currently on loan. Petrasso (above) provided an assist on the game’s only goal in a 1-0 victory on Saturday over Stevenage. On the other side of the ball, fellow Canadian Marcus Haber nearly nabbed a draw Stevenage, but his effort was turned away by Oldham’s ’keeper.
Also in England, Iain Hume put in 60 minutes of work for Preston North End in a 2-0 league loss to Wolves on Saturday, but didn’t feature in PNE’s 3-2 FA Cup win over Ipswich on Tuesday.
As is seemingly the case every single week, Pedro Pacheco put in a solid 90 minutes in midfield for CD Santa Clara on Sunday in Portugal’s second flight. On this occasion, the team fought to a 2-2 draw against UD Oliveirense in a game that saw three players shown red cards.
Julian de Guzman also put in a good day’s work, going 86 minutes for Skoda Xanthi in Greece’s Superleague, though his side fell to a 2-1 loss against Panthrakikos.
There was also a flurry of cross-border activity this week, with the LA Galaxy signing striker Rob Friend from 1860 Munich, and the NASL’s Ottawa Fury bringing home young fullback Andres Fresenga, from Racing Club de Montevideo in Uruguay.
Meanwhile, the NASL’s FC Edmonton announced that midfielder Hanson Boakai, who represented Canada at last year’s U-17 World Cup, is headed to Germany next week, to begin a month-long training stint with Fortuna Dusseldorf.
