Also, Summer Registration Open in Huntsville and Bracebridge, European First Leg Observations, Canadian teams out of Champions Cup, and has Kane brought the Tottenham stink to Bayern?

In a stunning back and forth affair this week in Huntsville Indoor League action, The EH Team fought Your Mum hard to finish knotted up at 10-10.

Both Your Mum and The EH Team were exhausted from their tussle, and neither had a happy ending, but rather were simply satisfied with the point.

In other action, the Golazos won a feisty affair with Thunder FC 7-4.

The last game of the week featured two squads decimated by illness and injury as Blue Moon and Grape Soda found themselves with short benches (no subs for either side).

It seems the lack of depth suited the Blue Moon side more, as they were able to stroll away with a 12-3 victory.

The win keeps Blue Moon atop the Indoor League standings, an important place to be as this year there are no playoffs, mimicking the European domestic leagues (like the Premier League or Serie A) where the champion is who finishes first at the end of the season.

SUMMER REGISTRATIONS OPEN IN MUSKOKA

Both the Huntsville Soccer Club and Bracebridge Soccer Club have opened their summer registrations for youth house league programs.

Youth age groups in both communities go from U4 to U12, with only Huntsville having a fun house league program for kids aged U13 to U15.

Both have adult programs with Huntsville featuring a co-ed experienced league, a co-ed intermediate league, a women’s league, and a men’s 7 v 7 league.

Bracebridge has both a recreational co-ed house league program and a men’s O35 team that plays in the HDSL.

Those interested in registering or learning more about Huntsville’s summer programs can visit: https://www.huntsvillesoccer.ca/

Those wanting to check out Bracebridge can go to: https://www.bracebridgesoccer.ca/

EUROPEAN FIRST LEGS

While some super interesting UEFA Champions League match-ups have their first legs coming up on Tuesday and Wednesday (Inter Milan-Atletico Madrid, Napoli-Barcelona), the first round of first legs this past week were “Meh” at best with mostly expected results (other than Lazio 1, Bayern 0 – but that we’ll touch on at the end of the column).

I think it’s fair to say that other than a handful of Europa League and two Conference League matches, most played were not overtly exciting.

However, in the few that were exciting, there were plenty of goals, maybe a red card, and drama until the end.

I won’t bore you with a play-by-play of each, but I’ll tell you ones that would be fun to watch on replay or at least check the highlights . . .

Europa League: Galatasaray 3, Sparta Praha 2 (red cards for each team); Shaktar Donesk 2, Marseille 2; Qarabag 4, Braga 2.

Conference League: Molde 3, Legia Warszawa 2; Union Saint-Gilloise 2, Eintracht Frankfurt 2; Ajax 2, Bodo Glimt 2.

The second legs across all Europa and Conference League ties in the KO round playoffs go on Thursday.

Champions League, Europa League and select Conference League matches are live on DAZN.

CONCACAF CHAMPIONS CUP

With both the Voyageurs Cup Champion Vancouver Whitecaps and Canadian Premier League Champion Hamilton Forge FC knocked out of the CONCACAF Champions Cup (the newest iteration of this region’s Champions League), the lone Canadian team left is Calgary’s Calvary FC.

They qualified for the tournament by being the CPL Shield winners (finishing first in the regular season). Calvary lost in the playoff final to Forge FC.

They’ll be taking on MLS Side Orlando over two-legs, “hosting” the first one at Starlight Stadium in Langford, B.C. on February 21 before traveling south for the second leg on February 27. Apparently, it’s a bit chilly in Calgary this time of year, that’s why the move to B.C.

It will be the first competitive meeting between a CPL club and an American MLS club, which is just one reason to watch.

The other is the fact that Calvary have a solid mix of young and experienced players, including at least one with MLS experience, so thinking the Calvary side can win the two-legged affair is not a far-fetched idea.

The match will likely be available to stream live on FuboTV.

is the SPURS STINK FOLLOWING harry KANE?

The heading is a legitimate question.

Sure, the English super striker is doing well individually (he usually does), but it’s looking more and more like no cups for Bayern this season.

Is it the Tottenham curse following their former captain?

Bayern are out of their domestic cup, trailing by five points in the Bundesliga, and lost their first leg match away to a horrid Lazio side 1-0.

Yeah, they’ll be favoured to beat Lazio in the second leg in Germany, but they looked listless in the first leg, so it’s not a sure thing by any means.

Even if they get by Lazio, they’ll likely fall to any of the much-better sides left in the tournament and they are no longer scaring anybody.

They’re looking like many a Spurs squads that jumped out when glancing at the line-up on paper and should have won things, but never did. Just disappointment after disappointment.

Kane has never won a league title, or anything of consequence, and if Bayern can’t find a way to pull themselves back to the top of the German topflight, he’ll go trophy-less once again.

Many an Arsenal fan would love to see that happen to their former nemesis (Roman, I’m looking at you, bro), and frankly I would find it pretty amusing too.

Even Jose Mourinho couldn’t win as a manager at Spurs, leaving after three trophy-less seasons (the only club he never won anything with) and then promptly winning a trophy in Rome and taking them to two European finals in two years (albeit the Conference and Europa Leagues). It should be noted that it was AS Roma’s first trophy of any kind since a Coppa Italia in 2008.

The Bayern faithful on the other hand would not find it funny at all, so accustomed they’ve become to winning shiny things.

A failure to do so this year would lead to their manager Thomas Tuchel being unceremoniously sacked after a short time in charge – another Tottenham specialty – and maybe it’s time to see the so-called “World’s Club” get taken down a couple notches.

We shall see!

Thanks for reading! Next week we’ll look ahead to Toronto FC’s 2024 MLS season, which kicks off on February 25.