'It means everything to me': Matteo Polisi's path to the CPL
From hauling garbage in the early-morning hours to scoring goals in the Winnipeg bubble
It wasn’t the smell that bothered Matteo Polisi. It was the weight. Four days a week, from March until June 2020, the twenty-three-year-old would leave his family home in Coquitlam to haul garbage for the City of Delta. The alarm sounded at 5:30 a.m.; the shifts started at 6:45 a.m.—a forty-minute drive down the Lougheed Highway and across the Fraser River.
“It was me and [my brother] Marcello,” he says. “Both of us did that gig for three or four months … the amount of garbage was insane, because everybody was staying at home. No-one was out. It was just us.”
Then approaching his fourth year at Simon Fraser University, the younger Polisi faced an uncertain future. Professional sports leagues were halting their seasons across the globe due to the emerging threat of the novel coronavirus. On March 12, 2020, Major League Soccer announced a 30-day shutdown—the first time the regular season had faced an interruption since September 11, 2001. That same day, the NCAA cancelled all winter and spring championships. On March 18, the British Columbia government declared a province-wide state of emergency.
“Everybody was staying at home. No-one was out. It was just us.”
Though the men’s soccer season at SFU wasn’t set to begin until September, as the weeks dragged on into April and May, the prospect of a normal season—any season at all—seemed about as thin as the plastic bags the Polisi brothers plucked from the curb each morning.
“Our mindset was [to] just try to make as much money as we can so we’d have enough money to potentially go to Europe [and find a club]. We didn’t know if there were going to be options here or if we’d have to go away,” says Polisi.
To think that Matteo and Marcello would be here today—first-year professionals with Pacific FC and HFX Wanderers FC, the former with six appearances and a goal to his growing list of accomplishments—seems nothing short of miraculous.
But, then, if you ask those around the Pacific FC attacking midfielder, it was only a matter of time before opportunity knocked.
‘A family thing’
If you wanted to get to the nearest soccer field from the Polisi family home, the way was simple. From Hibbard Avenue, you’d turn right onto Porter Street, then hang left on Como Lake Road. Parkland Elementary was off Poirier Street. Hillcrest Middle School was just three more blocks away. École Dr. Charles Best Secondary School was a little farther still, across from the forested fringe of Mundy Park.
“It was like a five-minute drive,” Polisi recalls. “The middle school and the elementary school were both grass fields, and then Charles Best”—where the Coquitlam-raised footballer would eventually attend—“was a turf field.”
Matteo started early in the sport—not all that much of a surprise, when you’re the youngest of three boys. He and Marcello would tag along to their oldest bother, Luigi’s games with the Coquitlam Metro-Ford Soccer Club.
“It was a family thing,” says Luigi, 26, a former three-year midfielder with the UBC Thunderbirds. “Even before we started playing soccer, we had soccer balls around the house, and we were passing to each other.”
“He was the only one of us three that was a genuine goalscorer, a pure goalscorer.”
Two sports ruled the Polisi household: soccer and hockey. The three bothers played both—spring, summer, fall, and winter.
“Some days, it was straight from [one] to [the other],” recalls the youngest Polisi.
When it got to the point where the brothers had to choose, each fell back on the beautiful game. Matteo was nine, maybe ten—already showing a knack for the sport. Before long, he joined the Vancouver Whitecaps FC academy. At thirteen, he captained the BC U-13 provincial team.
“He was the only one of us three that was a genuine goalscorer, a pure goalscorer,” says Luigi. The eldest Polisi recalls watching his younger brother shine in a U-12 Cup final with the Whitecaps academy. “At that point, I realized, he’s got something special. You’re kind of either born with that or not.”
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If the road began with promise for Polisi, the first speed bumps came at the age of fifteen. The Whitecaps academy released him. The door to professional soccer seemed as if it had slammed shut.
“I was pretty devastated,” says Polisi. “[But] I think I developed probably the most when I was actually released from [the] Whitecaps and went back to Metro-Ford … My coach there, Les Krivak, really helped push me, and he gave me opportunities to play with the men’s team as well.”
The joy didn’t come right away—“it took a couple months,” says Polisi. But soon, he realized the talent around him at Metro-Ford. In 2015, the club made the BC Provincial Cup Final. Polisi scored a hat-trick to secure the trophy.
“We were an unreal team,” Polisi recalls. “We had a lot of quality on that team, and it was just about gaining confidence and enjoying the game again.”
Polisi’s next brush with professional soccer came in 2016. At eighteen, he was invited to join the Portland Timbers’ Residency Program and went on trial in Europe. From October to November, and again in January, he spent time with Birmingham City, Derby County, and FC Nürnberg.
“I actually got in a Premier League Cup game against Stoke City,” says Polisi. “I played the last 20-25 minutes. It went well, but not well enough.”1
‘Dreamed about that moment my whole life’: From SFU to Pacific FC
After a year with the Timbers’ academy, Polisi joined his brother Marcello at Simon Fraser University. From 2017-19, he made 52 appearances, leading his team in scoring and overall points for three consecutive seasons.2 In summers, he moonlighted with the TSS FC Rovers in USL League Two, racking up eleven goals in 39 appearances.
And then 2020 hit. Practices, games, everything was cancelled.
As March became April, and the months dragged on through the summer, Polisi faced a predicament: the prospect of a pivotal year of soccer—one where he might hope to bolster his professional chances—pulled away.
And so, as August arrived, he called upon an old contact—one who had coached him years earlier with the BC provincial team: Pacific FC associate head coach James Merriman.
“I reached out to James when they were in the [PEI] bubble,” says Polisi, “and I just said, ‘Hey, I’m interested. Where are you guys at?’ That kind of thing. And he just said, ‘Yeah, we’ll touch base as soon as we get back from the bubble.”
Merriman invited Polisi to train with Pacific FC in October, after the club had returned to Vancouver Island. He stuck around until the end of training in November. By December, the club had offered him a contract.
“I’ve dreamed about that moment my whole life,” says Polisi.
The minutes wouldn’t be easy to come by. As an attacking midfielder and winger, he would have to compete with the likes of Marco Bustos, Victor Blasco, and Josh Heard for his coach’s trust—all while acclimatizing to a new roster, new organization, and new level of competition.
“When you come from the college game, it’s always different to when you enter a professional environment. It requires adaptation. But he’s done exceptionally well,” says head coach Pa-Modou Kah. “Every day, he’s looking to get better.”
Say this for Polisi: in six appearances, he wasted little time in making an impression. It took all of two starts for the Charles Best Secondary graduate to notch his first professional goal—the game-winner in a 3-0 victory over York United.
“[He’s] clean on the ball, and he just jells well with the team. He works hard. And he gets forward,” adds Pacific FC captain Jamar Dixon. “Any chances, you know he can put them away—and we need that.”
The season is far from over—and the story far from finished for Polisi. While the flashes of potential have been there, the bar becomes higher.
“I’m just trying to absorb, be a sponge,” says Polisi. “Learn as much as I can.”
Can he turn a single goal into four? Five? Can he bring the playmaking ability he showed at Simon Fraser to the next level? Can he make a difference on both sides of the ball?
Weighty expectations for a first-year pro—but, well, he’s carried heavier things before, hasn’t he?
When asked if it was a cold, rainy night, he laughed: “It was a Cup game, so it was a neutral venue.”
In 52 appearances for Simon Fraser University, Polisi notched 36 goals and added 18 assists.