…I know. Things have been busy and I haven’t been able to keep up with reports, but I’m back having attended the season finale at BMO Field, and have commentary and pictures to offer.  

Let’s start, first, with my general impressions of the end of the season and follow with my thoughts on the final games from last Saturday.

Firstly, let’s put it out there - I’m disappointed. I’m not delusional, however, and I know that the quality of the TFC team did not deserve a playoff birth, yet I can only feel disappointed that the season has come to an end and the roller-coaster ride, as Jim Brennan put it, has come to a rather abrupt halt.

Brennan is right (and good luck asking me to ever find a fault with our captain) in saying the TFC fans are the best in the league - I’ve seen comparable efforts made in other stadiums - and we deserve to see games well into the cold of November. I hope he keeps his promise to bring us to the play-offs next year.

While on the subject of Brennan, good on the North End Elite for presenting him with the award for Man of the Year. Almost an obvious choice and certainly the right one.

I have trouble with the idea that the results of Toronto FC had anything to do with effort. The effort, in my mind, was always there but the lack of quality was sometimes hard to ignore. Like the old song says, “if you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with,” and I think that sums up the love affair we’ve had with the squad this year. They haven’t necessarily been what we truly would have wanted on the pitch, but the support from us and the effort from them was rarely absent from the team as a whole. Individual efforts were certainly lacking at times, but to say the team took a day off would be a stretch.

All in all, I have to go out of my way to thank everyone that had anything to do with Toronto FC this year. They’ve produced a truly enjoyable experience regardless of the on-field product. Make no mistake, however, next year will have to show an improvement (and a big one at that) to be truly deserved of our continued support.