RIGHT: Giovinco’s goals and assists soon led to silverware for Toronto BOTTOM RIGHT: A prolific No 10, Giovinco was soon in the goals
QUESTION: TORONTO WAS A GREAT EXPERIENCE FOR YOU. HOW WAS YOUR DAILY LIFE IN CANADA? Answer: The life was amazing. I enjoyed it there very much. I also enjoyed the football. There were a lot of good players during the period I was there. It was a good experience for me to play there and try also to win something. It was a great experience. Q: WHAT ABOUT THE FOOTBALL IN TORONTO? YOU WERE USED TO ITALY, WHERE THE SPORT IS NO 1. HOW WAS IT BEING IN A CITY AND A COUNTRY WITH A DIFFERENT APPROACH TO THE SPORT? A: Yes, it isn’t the first sport, in North America there are more famous sports, but it was nice because Toronto fans love the sport and there is a big Italian community in Toronto. So football was growing there, like all of North America. You can’t compare the two places but it is growing, of course. Q: HOW WOULD YOU RATE AND COMPARE THE LEVEL OF MLS? A: You can’t compare it. The league is different, different between all the leagues everywhere and they’re not the same. It depends, MLS is different during the season between the playoff games and the regular season games. When you reach the playoff games the level is high, so there are different things about it.
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SOCCER360 MAY • JUNE 2021
SEBASTIAN GIOVINCO LEFT A LEGACY AT TORONTO FC WHEN HE LEFT THE CLUB IN 2019. PART OF THE HISTORIC 2017 TREBLE-WINNING TEAM, THE AL HILAL FORWARD SHARED HIS THOUGHTS ON MLS AND TORONTO REGRETS IN AN EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW WITH SOCCER360’S EMANUELE GIANELLI.
You always learn something when you go to play in Italy, Canada or America, or here in Saudi Arabia. You always learn new things. MLS can still improve but it takes a lot of time. They have to start to teach children when they’re young, so it takes time. Giovinco was part of the Al Hilal team that won the Asian Champions League in 2019 and while that success was celebrated to the full, it brought back a memory of his biggest disappointment during his Toronto career – the 2018 CONCACAF Champions League final defeat to Mexico’s Chivas Guadalajara after a 3-3 draw over two legs and a 4-2 penalty shootout defeat. Giovinco scored in the second leg and netted his penalty in the shootout but, he says, that did not ease the pain. Q: WHAT WERE YOUR BEST MOMENTS IN TORONTO? AND DO YOU FEEL MORE REGRET OR PRIDE ABOUT THE CONCACAF CHAMPIONS LEAGUE FINAL? A: The best moment was winning the treble. When you win, of course it is a good feeling. The Champions League final we lost on penalties. When you lose on penalties you feel unlucky, but not many had reached that level in the United States and we were the first Canadian team to reach the final. We could have won because we dominated the game and losing on penalties is not like losing
