Once again, Matt VanOekel will be an NASL play-of-the-week candidate. He could be the league’s player of the week, week after week after week. You get the feeling that the brass at NASL is just being nice, letting other players have the awards.

There were some hints dropped Friday that suggest that the loan of Canadian keeper Nathan Ingham from FC Edmonton to TFCII could be the beginning of something greater.

In a release issued Thursday, ALERT (Alberta Law Enforcement Response Teams) states that the Jalali brothers were arrested in south Edmonton Wednesday. ALERT states that Sadi’s Infiniti was pulled over, and that police found 16 bags of cocaine and $5,285 in what it calls "proceeds of crime."

It’s the longest road trip in a North American pro sports league. At just a little more than 5,600 km, it’s about the same distance as a flight between Toronto and London, England, or a jaunt between Ottawa and Oslo, Norway.

Maybe the Carolina RailHawks need to hire a shaman. Maybe someone at the club has wronged a Canadian in the past, and to fix it they’ll need to have Drew Beckie sing William Shatner quotes to the tunes of Rush songs.

The Eddies are set to fill their open international roster spot, as Argentine midfielder Nicolas Di Biase trained with the team Friday.

If the Eddies are indeed putting together a special sort of season, they may look back on Wednesday’s 2-1 win at home over the New York Cosmos as the day they went from “the team that’s on a hot streak” to a “team that’s a genuine contender for a Soccer Bowl.”

The Eddies have completed the paperwork when it comes to signing these two players, and the Canadian Soccer Association has done its part. But the Eddies need the Spanish FA to sign off on Fisk — who most recently played in Spain — and the Portuguese federation to green-light Galvao’s move.

It was only the Eddies second loss in 10 games. But, you might have figured that this one was gonna be a problem for FCE.

Dixon is just part of a growing trend of Canadians who are deciding that home soil is the best place for them to be. Dixon, who got his first national-team call-up earlier this year, is the newest member of the “come back to Canada club.”