September 22, 2018 Exhibition game--York 9 Celebrity All-Stars vs Aurora Alumni game review (by Rocket Robin)

Results and details of the Saturday September 22, 2018 special exhibition game between the York 9 Celebrity All-Stars and the Aurora Alumni team played at Highland Park in Aurora at 2:00pm. This was an exhibition game and the game was split into two 30 minute halfs with only a three minute halftime intermission. There were unlimited substitutions so players were rotated in three or four times.

Craig Forrest and James Sharmon were not there. Camilo Benzi #21 was in goal, #20 was 'Ryan' somebody...probably a coach for one of the youth teams for what the kids watching were cheering him on. Another player wore #19. The York 9 lineup was made up of former Canadian National Team players and media types (some have had careers doing both). From the graphic the players' previous teams are listed except to avoid mentioning Toronto Lynx*. I mean if they mention Dave Diplacido played for Montreal Impact (who were in USL at the time in just 2005 where his Lynx career ran from 1998 to 2006). *Adrian Serioux, Marco Reda, Chris Williams, and Paul Stalteri also spent time with Toronto Lynx. The opponents were the Aurora Alumni team who I know little about except they looked like a bunch of 40 years old with a few 50+. Their advantage was they had a roster of about 22 guys so with frequent subs they looked fresher and were carrying the game near the end playing in the All Stars end. As I didn't have the lineup for the Aurora team and I could see the subs starting at the five minute mark I didn't bother keeping a game log. I also planned to take in two League 1 Ontario games today so I'd be making enough notes. I was glad I heard ahead of time that the game would only run one hour or I would have left at halftime to drive down the street to get there in time to watch Aurora FC—the L1O team. The only game official was a referee who had a tough job with the circus of substitutions and trying to judge offside calls on his own. 17 min...YAS Terry Dunfield GOAL...YAS Andrew Ornoch takes 25 yard shot from the left has goalie fly to push the ball wide right. Dunfield takes 10 yard shot into the top left corner. 19 min...YAS Andrew Ornoch GOAL...YAS Terry Dunfield centers pass from 22 yards and Ornoch shoots low 15 yarder into the left corner of the net. 30 min...half time. 38 min...YAS Jimmy Brennan GOAL...Brennan takes 30 yard shot down the middle into the top left corner of net. 43 min...YAS #19 GOAL...YAS Andrew Ornoch centers pass from right and #19 blasts shot between players over sliding goalie into middle of net. 58 min...Aur #8 GOAL...#8 takes a 12 yard shot from the far right into the top left of the net. 60 min...end of game Final Score:...York 9 Celebrity All Stars.....4......Aurora Alumni.......1........ Certainly York 9 had more talent that the Alumni but that team had enough chances to actually win except for inaccurate shooting. I counted them having the last seven chances of the game until their late goal. The Jimmy Brennan goal was vintage from his Toronto FC days. A defender sending in a long bomb on target. I know today he was definitely playing center midfield and there were teammates setting him up. It would certainly be used as a talking point. From the pre-announced Celebrity roster goalie Craig Forrest (note the typo) and James Sharman were not there. I am not sure if Sportsnet's EPL coverage ran longer today although Brendan Dunlop who is also from Sportsnet was on the field. So who played in goal for the All Stars? He was dressed in an all black kit and had 'Isaaco' in white lettering. No this did not look like Carmine Isaaco who was named an assistant coach for York 9. During the game the real Carmine Isaaco arrived. He had come directly from the grand opening of the North Maple Regional Park that started at 1:00pm. This is a 900 acre facility that will be the home of all the Vaughan Azzurri youth and League 1 Ontario team. I asked Isaaco if the goalie was his brother. No it is just he loaned Camilo Benzi his kit was his answer. With the music and noise it took me awhile to hear correctly. He reminded me that Benzi played for years for York Region Shooters. Now I remembered. York Region Shooters and Italian Shooters of the CSL 2006-2011 just from a rough archive search. He had to make some key saves to keep the Alumni from scoring. Attendance was at least 300 to 400 as there may have been a lot of people inside the clubhouse. I left after the game but it is believable that even more people arrived later for the meet-and-greet and the barbecue that followed and even a U-17 scheduled for later. York 9 had set up a information/souvenir booth and parked their decal/specially painted cars at strategic places in the parking lot. They had lots of child supporters wearing York 9 t-shirts I'd expect from local soccer clubs cheering especially for Brennan. There were 'Degeneration IX' banners strung up to the fences. The media presence was scarce. The radio station '105.9 The Region' was there. They have the same colours as York 9. An official in their tent said they've been on the air for five years and are a music station so he didn't expect they'll do play-by-play broadcasts of any games. Background music provided today sounded like and pop 80s playlist but the radio station is listed as adult contemporary with ethnic programming at different times. The only other journalist was a photographer from Snapd, the free local glossy community paper found at the doorways of grocery and drug stores. Since that paper is very localized, I don't expect I'll ever see pictures in the Snapd North York edition. I was there extremely early. No traffic on the weekend was part of the reason but also I wanted to speak to various York 9 and Canadian Premier League officials about doing some independent reporting for them. I was showing off my L1O knowledge to Kurt Larson by naming the four players who flew all the way to Halifax and passed the two day trials the day before for a training camp invite. Larson is the Managing Editor/Director of Content for CPL. It looked promising that day but the e-mail address I wrote to has given me no response at this time (September 28th and waiting). I think I know where the Aurora logo comes from. I was waiting for the players and crowd to arrive and maybe I was standing too close to some of the trash bins. Geez where are all these wasps/hornets coming from? Ok the trash bins. The staff noticed that too so spent some time spraying the area (obviously not the first time this problem has occurred as the bug killer was readily available). Ironic killing of their namesakes. So off to some League 1 Ontario action! Rocket Robin robing@eol.ca @RocketRobin01

York 9 Celebrity All Stars