Smits — who won the NASL Golden Glove last year for posting the best goals-against average in the league — will leave for Costa Rica after the Jacksonville match. His loan only extends to April 8, so he will be back in Edmonton for the April 12 home opener vs. Carolina.

After the NASL spring season launches, Commissioner Bill Peterson, along with the owners of FC Edmonton and the Ottawa Fury, look to form a task force to help attract more potential investors to the league.

NASL Commissioner Bill Peterson doesn’t believe player quotas achieve what’s supposed to be their ultimate goal — to develop domestic players.

And while no coach will confirm or deny what the starting XI will be ahead of time, there’s a feeling that Tuesday’s preseason curtain-closer against Jacksonville United might give Eddies fans a closer idea of what the lineup will look like when Colin Miller and his troops begin the NASL season April 4 in the first-ever home opener for the expansion Jacksonville Armada.

On Friday, a week after JDG’s WEM declaration, it’s official. The Canadian midfielder will play for the Fury in 2015.

FC Edmonton and Ottawa Fury supporters will be able to access the majority of their teams away-game broadcasts this year via TSN GO.

But, with the Flyover Cup — a supporter-driven initiative which sees the winner of the FCE/Loons season series get the award — it should be Minnesota who is our closest rival. But, in a weird way, the Loons are kind of like the Eddies’ best frenemy. We’re the cold-weather cities in a league filled with tropical teams; we’re united in our sense of isolation from the rest of the NASL.

Julian de Guzman has played in Germany and Spain; he’s been a Designated Player in Major League Soccer. Is his next stop the North American Soccer League? The veteran Canadian national-team midfielder, at the West Edmonton Mall Friday for the launch of the new red Canada kit, said he hopes to have a new team at the end of March. …

All you do is this: If you would spend $500 a ticket (yes, I know some tickets would be less, some would be more, but this is a good median figure), then go down and click off a box that corresponds to your region. Please don’t vote more than once. I have this poll policed, but technology is never 100 per cent efficient.

Even though the deal was announced on Tuesday, it was signed well before the Eddies left for their three-week Florida-based portion of their training camp. (The Eddies’ last day in Edmonton was last Friday). But, paperwork in the soccer world can move so darn slow, so the deal couldn’t be made official till after the team had left for the United States.