FC Edmonton scares the hell out of me. Although I believe that the ownership group is sincere in its desire to bring a first class soccer operation to Northern Alberta, I'm not completely convinced that they know how to do that. Everything about Edmonton, from the Microsoft Paint-like logo to the oddly pieced together exhibition schedule they played in 2010, seems just a little off. It's incredibly hard to imagine that the club will be traveling to BMO Field in 2011 to take on the Reds in a competitive match.
Today's announcement that the club has found a new head coach just days after the last one escaped town does little to ease those concerns. It's not often that a departing coach hires his replacement, but that seems to be what happened in Edmonton.
In the hours that followed head coach Dwight Lodeweges and assistant Hans Schrijver's move to Japan, Schrijver was on the phone to a buddy who was coaching in Jakarta, Indonesia. Hours later that man, Harry Sinkgraven, was booking flights to Alberta.
Talk about nepotism.
Hopefully this works out for Edmonton, but to say that the hiring is unconventional is a bit of an understatement.
As I said on It's Called Football tonight, a positive thing about the Canadian soccer scene over the last few years is there hasn't been a spectacular failure (yes, I know that's not saying much, but you have to live here to understand). There hasn't been a major club go under. The exhibition season in Edmonton did not inspire too much confidence, but they are still here...hiring coaches without appearing to undertake proper searches.
Here’s hoping Canada’s (very) modest streak of good fortune continues regardless