Scottish trialist Proctor trains with FC Edmonton

After bringing in American midfielder Bryan Arguez on loan from the Montreal Impact earlier this week, FC Edmonton began auditioning a new import trialist Thursday.

Scottish right-sided player David Proctor was on the Clarke Stadium pitch Thursday. As well, the team is expected to have a new Brazilian striker in camp by Friday. (FRIDAY UPDATE: Because of visa paperwork that needs to be completed, the Brazilian player won’t be with the club until that is done)

Earlier this week, FC Edmonton’s director of soccer, Joe Petrone, had said that the team would soon be bringing in two trialists — and now it’s a matter of waiting and seeing if the new charges can help improve a team that’s enduring a disappointing NASL campaign that has seen it win just three of its first 14 matches of the season.

Proctor is a 28-year-old defender who spent last season in the Scottish Premier League with Inverness Caledonian Thistle. Proctor can play as a holding midfielder, a centre-half or as a right back. And, he has his UEFA B coaching badge, so if he does sign with FCE, he could be a player who can help be a dressing-room leader for the team’s young core of players.

“It’s (coaching) definitely something I am interested in pursuing, and it’s also an advantage to have it as a player,” he said. “It makes a player more attractive to the manager, that in training you can help work with some of the younger players.”

Proctor has made 140 Scottish League (including Premier League and lower divisions) and Cup appearances for Inverness Caldedonian Thistle, Airdrie United and Dundee United, where he spent a short spell in 2006-07. By far, the vast majority of his appearances came as a member of Inverness, where he has spent the majority of his professional career.

Proctor said he first talked with Petrone over the phone a couple of weeks ago, and a move to North America, with a “different lifestyle,” intrigued him. And he’s adaptable to take any spot in the lineup that coach Harry Sinkgraven wants to put him in.

“I’ll have to wait and see where the team wants to play me. But I am willing to play wherever the team needs me to play, wherever I can help the team.”

So far, Proctor likes what he saw, that FC Edmonton practiced at a high tempo despite playing on artificial turf at Clarke Stadium in heat in excess of 30 C.

“The team was positive. (Assistant coach Hans Schrijver) had the team pressuring the ball defensively as well as attacking. This is a team that wants to pressure the opposition.”

And, Scotland is a little bit less of an attractive place to play now that Rangers’ bankruptcy has put the one-time giant in limbo. For smallers clubs like Inverness, the Rangers and Celtic gates were massive — and those teams have now lost one half of those.

“What happened to Rangers was very hard for Scottish football,” he said. “Obviously, it is not just one of the biggest teams in Scotland, but in the U.K, in all of Europe. It is hard to see a club with so much history go down like that. And there’s going to be a long, knock-on effect for Scottish football.”