Mozzi Gyorio is set for a return to the NASL — a league he is in the process of suing.

“It was Ritchie Jones who reached out,” said Eckersley. “And I wanted something a bit different for my family. And my little brother has played in Canada, for Toronto, and he had nothing but good things to say about Canada.”

We’ve seen this over and over. A young players come up through our system, and then our small-but-oh-so-loud Canadian soccer community gives the kid way too much praise, way too much hype. It’s understandable, we’re so desparate for a saviour, an instant solution to decades worth of soccer rot, that we latch on to 17-year-old after 17-year-old. The message boards fill up with dreams of big moves to big clubs. And whether your name is Aleman, Alderson or Teibert, the overreaction to some early career successes puts you on a path to meet expectations that can’t possibly be met.

FC Edmonton coach Colin Miller feels this has been the most promising off-season in the club’s history.

Last November, after he’d wrapped up his NCAA season as the No. 1 shot stopped at Florida Gulf Coast University, the Canadian keeper got a call from FC Edmonton goalkeeping coach Darren Woloshen. Ingham learned that the NASL club had a lot of interest in signing the him — but the team had to know ASAP if the feeling was mutual. The Eddies wanted to get their roster sorted sooner rather than later.

At the end of the season, he said the players were told that they should go out and try to find new teams — but, if things changed, they could get a call back to come to Atlanta. So, Porter headed home to the Toronto area, where he worked out with a group of Canadian players who had dubbed themselves “Free Agent FC:” that group included former FC Edmonton players John Smits and Alex Semenets, retired MLS great Dwayne De Rosario and defender Nana Attakora.

Nik Ledgerwood felt the time was right to come back home.

So, it feels like Calgary Foothills, which began PDL play last season, is swimming against the tide, at least when it comes to developmental soccer in Canada.

Soccer officials in the United States are moving to ban heading of the ball in youth soccer. Similar measures have been debated in Canada — but we’ve decided to go with an approach that stresses education over regulation. But, is there hard, peer-reviewed evidence out there that supports the notion that heading the ball leads to brain injuries?

The USL’s Austin Aztex announced that the club would not play in 2016 because of issues securing a suitable soccer stadium that the team could call its own. That left Aztex coach Paul Dalglish looking for work rather than preparing his squad for the upcoming season. But, timing is everything; as Dalglish hit the job market, the Ottawa Fury confirmed that coach Marc Dos Santos would not be back in 2016. Dalglish got MDS’s old job — but, will it be a marriage made in heaven?