“We have been working hard,” said Saiko from Florida, as the Eddies prepare to face the Tampa Bay Rowdies on Saturday. “We were disappointed in the loss, but there were some positives that we felt we could build on, and there are things that we’d like to correct.”

FC Edmonton was a man up for more than 50 minutes of soccer, but never asserted its numerical superiority and fell 1-0 on the road to the Fort Lauderdale Strikers in their NASL season opener.

Playing their final tuneup match before Saturday’s NASL curtain raiser in Fort Lauderdale, FC Edmonton lost 2-0 on the road to the Minnesota Stars.

As the full-time whistle sounded, nearly every Canadian player slumped to the field in disappointment. They weren’t expected to win, but it didn’t diminish the stings they were feeling.

The good news? The team added another Canadian to the roster, with Ottawa native and former Syracuse University defender Kenny Caceros being added to the team. The bad news? Goalkeeper David Monsalve is expected to miss the first road trip of the season after spraining his ankle in training Thursday.

Canada looked comfortable until substitute Maykel Reyes leapt high and headed past a helpless Michal Misciewicz, who had kept a spotless goalkeeping record through every other minute of the tournament to date. The game ended in a 1-1 draw.

“Everyone’s just happy. That’s the most important thing. But the coaches told us we can’t get overconfident,” said captain Nana Attakora. “We still have a game on Monday and if we lose that game, this game is meaningless.”

“In tournaments like this it’s important for a team to start well,” said Canadian head coach Tony Fonseca. “I think the way they faced this game was a certain level of stress coming into the first game. I think they faced it with being a little bit nervous for our taste.”

Barry Rice’s strange pass-that-became-a-shot allowed FC Edmonton to escape its first preseason match of the 2012 season with a draw.

Four days before the team is supposed to gather in Sunrise, Fla. for a pre-Olympic qualifying camp, the Canadian Soccer Association has officially announced the 23-player roster.