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Champions Cup heroics latest example of Tobias Warschewski’s brilliance when it matters most
February 7, 2025
Canadian Premier League
News

When Tobias Warschewski signed with Cavalry FC ahead of the 2024 season, he said that he “can’t wait to join the squad and contribute to this club.” Fast forward a year, and he has lived up to that tenfold. 

In fact, it’s hard to think of many players in Canadian Premier League history who have had an impact in just one year for their club quite like Warschewski has during his tenure with the Cavs so far. 

Thursday night’s Concacaf Champions Cup goal at Starlight Stadium was the latest moment of brilliance from the German striker, who celebrated his 27th birthday with another highlight-reel finish. He managed to stay onside before a perfect first touch took the defender out of the play, followed by a vicious volley to give his side a 2-1 lead. With ten minutes to go at their home away from home, the goal proved to be the winner as Cavalry downed Mexican giants Pumas for the first ever win over a Liga MX club by a CPL team, and the first ever positive result of any kind by a CPL club in the competition. 

It was a historic goal. One that will be talked about for years. One that few players would have even attempted.

But Warschewski is capable of doing things that many players can only dream of. 

“Tobi’s a special player,” said Cavalry FC manager Tommy Wheeldon Jr. after Thursday’s match. “That’s high level; if that’s an MLS or Liga MX player doing that, people are going to be raving about him.”

It certainly isn’t a goal Cavalry fans will soon forget — even if Warschewski himself doesn’t really remember it, admitting in a postgame interview that he blacked out for a second.

He has always been a special talent in the CPL. That much was evident when he led the league in assists in 2021 in his first year with FC Edmonton. His place in CPL folklore was cemented in 2022 when his acrobatic stoppage time bicycle kick in the first game of the year caught eyes around the world.

He has never been afraid to try something, anything, no matter how audacious it may seem. Sometimes that confidence is all you need.

Warschewski spent a year away from the sport in 2023 after the Eddies’ unfortunate suspension of operations, but Cavalry knew what he was capable of. They brought him “off the sofa and away from the PlayStation” according to Tommy Wheeldon Jr, back to Alberta where he got match fit again. It was somewhat of a gamble by Cavalry, but it turns out they have hit the jackpot. 

Warschewski was so effective once he hit his stride that he won the Golden Boot in his first year back, scoring twice on the final day of the regular season to rip the award out of the hands of Atlético Ottawa’s Ruben del Campo. 

Tobias Warschewski receives the 2024 CPL Golden Boot award. (Photo: CPL/Chant)

Cavalry have always been a very good regular season team, but before 2024 had never seen that success translate to the playoffs. Something always went wrong – a red card to Joel Waterman in the 2019 Final, not playing to the whistle in the 2021 playoffs and conceding a poor late winner, or the unlikeliest of Olimpicos cruelly snatching away the 2023 crown. 

Until Tobi helped them over the edge.

It was his goal that saw them beat Forge in the playoffs for the first time in the 2024 semi-final, made sweeter by the fact that it was in Hamilton to secure home field advantage for the CPL Final. Then he scored the opening goal of the Final with a well-struck penalty that ignited the celebrations at ATCO Field as they went on to beat their bitter rivals a second time to lift their first North Star Cup in club history. 

The player receiving the inaugural CPL Final MVP award? None other than Mr. Warschewski. A loud roar and “M-V-P” chants followed the announcement from commissioner Mark Noonan.

Warschewski now has goals in each of his last six competitive matches in all competitions — a CPL record — scoring eight times in that span. All of them have been part of a crucial stretch at the end of last season and the beginning of a new one here in 2025. In total, he has 16 goals in 32 appearances for the Cavs – an impressive rate of 50 per cent. 

He also scored the winning goal for the Cavs in their Canadian Championship victory over Vancouver FC in 2024, nearly two years to the day after scoring against the Cavs in the same competition with the Eddies. Now he can add an incredible, Dennis Bergkamp-esque continental game-winning goal to his resume.

He rises to the occasion in games that matter the most, something that can’t always be taught. What it can do though is create legends, and Warschewski has quickly become one in southern Alberta.

Next week Cavalry will head south to Mexico, looking to make more club history and complete one of the biggest upsets in the competition’s history. Would you bet against Warschewski and Cavalry doing it again?