What lessons can the Wanderers learn from Toronto FC?
As the Halifax Wanderers fell 3-1 to Toronto FC in a Thursday night friendly at the Wanderers Grounds, there was an uncanny feeling of déjà-vu among the unusual opponents. Despite their differing leagues and wildly different payrolls, both clubs find themselves in similar straits: on the periphery of the playoff picture, with lingering doubts about how to get there or stay there.
Both the Wanderers and TFC entered 2026 with promise, only to falter as the calendar turned to May. Both clubs have struggled to keep the ball out of their net — especially, it seems, when Atlético Ottawa are involved. Both have been undone by injuries to key players, from Wanderers centre-back Thomas Meilleur-Giguère to TFC talisman Djordje Mihailovic.
But while the Reds are looking to reach the rarefied heights they once occupied in the MLS and Canadian football, the Wanderers are still looking for their first glimpse of the mountaintop. Eight seasons into their Canadian Premier League (CPL) existence, the Halifax side are still without silverware. It has become a point of obsession for Wanderers president Derek Martin and a source of frustration for the Wanderers faithful who, for the better part of those eight seasons, have shown up at the Grounds on match days, rain or shine.
“The beauty of sport,” Martin told HFX Football Post last November, “is there's a scoreboard so it's quite easy to figure out if you've achieved your goals or not based on what the scoreboard says.”
What, then, might the Wanderers learn from their compatriots’ past successes, distant though they may be? And what cautionary tales might they avoid?
Long climb to the top
Toronto FC’s origins will sound familiar enough to any Wanderers supporter: The club’s inaugural season in 2007 is best remembered not for its on-field successes, of which there were few, but rather its ability to ignite a fan base desperate for a team to call their own. The Reds finished last in the MLS Eastern Conference but still sold out every match at BMO Field. Fans turned up in droves to serenade the likes of Danny Dichio and Jimmy Brennan. It was different from anything else in Toronto — and much of MLS, for that matter.
“Toronto sports fandom has always been: sit in your seat, listen to the [announcer] telling you to stand up, cheer,” the Red Patch Boys’ Brad Humber told MLSsoccer.com’s James Grossi. “When TFC started, there were no real rules for supporting: it was go out, have some fun in the sun, drink some beers. And different from other kind of sports it was more of a community, more like a family; a neighbourhood barbecue but every game.”
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TFC’s fan support survived through years of stumbling on the pitch, from head-coaching carousels to a nine-game losing streak at the start of 2012. The Reds went their first eight seasons without making the playoffs, despite, at various points in their history, featuring the likes of Jermain Defoe, Dwayne De Rosario, and Torsten Frings.
The Halifax Wanderers, for their part, have enjoyed some earlier successes, even if in small measures: The club made the final of the 2020 Island Games and reached the playoffs in 2023 and 2025. The Wanderers were a tiebreaker away from finishing second in the CPL table in Patrice Gheisar’s first of three seasons at the helm. And yet, the club’s history of knockout match success is largely nonexistent. Halifax has flamed out in the first round of the Canadian Championship for four years running. The Wanderers lost their first home playoff match in history to an opponent who travelled across four time zones to reach Halifax, and their second on penalties to a lower-seeded Inter Toronto squad. Moreover, in the lone final the Wanderers reached, the club was held scoreless.
All of which prompted Wanderers president Derek Martin to “move in a different direction” this past offseason and “try something else” with the hiring of head coach and general manager Vanni Sartini. So far, the Wanderers have four wins, three draws, and six losses in the regular season under their new boss.
Martin is betting on Sartini’s experience with the Vancouver Whitecaps, where he won three Canadian Championship titles, to lift the Wanderers to new heights.
"The (Wanderers), I would say, have done pretty well the last few years,” Sartini told HFX Football Post upon his hiring in December. “Now, it's just a little bit of the last steps.”
But the more apt comparison for Halifax might be TFC, rather than Vanni’s Whitecaps. And that offers both reasons for hope and some concern.
Piecing a winner together
Three successive moves turned Toronto FC’s fortunes from perennial losers to title contenders: the arrival of TFC general manager Tim Bezbatchenko in 2013, the beginning of Greg Vanney’s tenure as head coach in 2014, and the on-field nucleus of Michael Bradley, Sebastian Giovinco, and Jozy Altidore forming in 2015.
Under Bezbatchenko’s watch, TFC went from missing the playoffs in 2014 to making an MLS Cup Final run in 2016. Along the way, Giovinco won the MLS Golden Boot and MVP award. Then, in 2017, the Reds won the MLS Cup, the Supporters’ Shield and the Canadian Championship — the only Canadian team to achieve the feat.
The credit belongs to more than just Giovinco and his penchant for goals. With Bezbatchenko in charge, the Reds acquired the likes of Justin Morrow, Drew Moor, Victor Vazquez, Chris Mavinga, and Marky Delgado, all of whom became key contributors around TFC’s star trio of Giovinco, Altidore, and Bradley. The surrounding cast transformed Toronto from a one-dimensional attack — occasionally brilliant, easily thwarted — to a true ensemble.
“The system is designed for the top teams to be cut down,” Bezbatchenko told Sportsnet in 2017. “It’s designed to create parity … You can be creative in all sorts of ways … but the reality is that it’s very difficult in a salary cap league.”
The Wanderers have assembled talented rosters before — twice, boasting the league’s Golden Boot-winner and claiming the league’s MVP with Joao Morelli in 2021 — but the rest of the puzzle pieces haven’t yet come together. Halifax’s once-promising nucleus of Lorenzo Callegari, Dan Nimick, and Massimo Ferrin lasted two seasons and ended in disappointment. Tiago Coimbra was an unstoppable force in 2025, but injuries prevented an earlier breakout season. Other talents, like Giorgio Probo, fell out with the club due to personality clashes.
With the recent emergence of Isaiah Johnston and Tavio Ciccarelli, along with the steadying presence of goalkeeper Marco Carducci, the Wanderers appear to have found the beginnings of an identity. But until the club finds a way to beat an opponent other than Pacific FC and Vancouver FC, any talks of an upswing feel premature.
How close, then, are the Wanderers to finding an on-field nucleus akin to what Giovinco, Bradley, and Altidore produced in Toronto’s heyday? How alike are Vanni and Vanney? And what other cues might the Wanderers take from Bezbatchenko’s squad-building savvy?
Finding an edge
There are different ways to build a winner in the Canadian Premier League. Unlike Toronto FC’s MLS, there is no Designated Player rule that offers a fast-track to acquiring MVP-level talent. Winning requires careful scouting, recruitment, and a well-defined culture. Forge FC’s title-winning teams have relied on continuity and a positionless ethos espoused by head coach Bobby Smyrniotis. Atletico Ottawa’s North Star Cup-winning team benefitted from high-impact loanees — most notably, David Rodriguez — and an unleashed Sam Salter. Pacific FC’s 2021 title-winning team featured just four international players and relied heavily on a midfield controlled by Manny Aparicio and Alessandro Hojabrpour, along with a red-hot Alejandro Diaz.
The teams that have lifted the North Star Cup — and before it, the North Star Shield — have boasted depth that the Wanderers don’t seem to have at the moment. It is the reason Sartini has admitted to looking at “a ton of players” his side might add before the transfer window closes. The Wanderers are thin at the full-back and wing positions and, with the exception of Ciccarelli, haven’t found goals from their strikers.
Sartini’s gamble coming into the 2026 season was that he could tap into MLS Next Pro and unearth CPL-ready talents. Gheisar’s belief before him was that he could find an edge combing through Ontario Premier League and NCAA-level players. Stephen Hart’s conviction was that he could call on his Trinidadian contacts. All three men were proven right and wrong.
Bezbatchenko’s gift with TFC was his ability to take both big swings — luring the likes of Bradley and Giovinco — along with the less-flashy moves that turned TFC into a contender. The Wanderers have made some swings of their own, pulling Meilleur-Giguère and Carducci away from their longtime CPL clubs and convincing Callegari to remain in Halifax.
Now, the work remains to build a squad around them.
Plenty still ahead for Wanderers to play for
Thursday’s friendly with Toronto FC provided glimpses of the heights the Wanderers could still reach. Backup goalkeeper Sinclair Astridge made a number of massive stops to keep his side in the match, including a pair of close-range efforts from TFC’s $22-million striker, Josh Sargent. Miguel Arilla brought the Wanderers Grounds supporters to their feet in the first half, coolly slotting a shot past ‘keeper Luka Gavran. Kareem Sow proved he was up for the occasion, keeping Theo Corbeanu’s attacks at bay.
Fifteen matches remain in the 2026 CPL season — long enough to erase any early season stumbles. Long enough, too, to stumble some more. The Wanderers looked to be walking away with a draw against TFC until an 85th-minute go-ahead goal from Malik Henry, who one-touched a long diagonal ball past Astridge to tap it in. Another TFC goal followed in the 88th minute to seal the victory for the Reds.
The loss will sting for the Wanderers, even if it won’t count against them in the CPL table. But losses can serve as lessons, too. For one night, and the better part of 90 minutes, they tested an MLS opponent and almost came away as equals.
The difference, of course, remains in the margins. And so, too, does the work.
Editor's Note: This article is part of our free coverage.
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Josh Healey
Josh Healey
Josh Healey
Cover Photo Credit: Michael Chisholm / Canadian Premier League
