An unexpected brace from Mathieu Choinière helped maintain LAFC’s perfect start to the season. Plus, it was an emotional rollercoaster for Janine Sonis in the Denver Summit’s inaugural match and Ali Ahmed kept up his strong play in the Championship. Here’s a look at Canadians in action over the weekend.
Mathieu Chonière, Los Angeles FC
You will never confuse Mathieu Choiniére for a goal scorer, but on Saturday evening at BMO Stadium, the 27-year-old Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Que. native was responsible for all of the offence as Los Angeles FC maintained its perfect start to the season under new manager, Montreal’s Marc Dos Santos. Los Angeles welcomed St. Louis City, who came into the match searching for their first league win of 2026.
The hosts should have been ahead in the match’s opening minute. Heung-min Son played Denis Bouanga into the area and the Gabon hitman’s shot had too much on it as it skipped off of the crossbar and over. Bouanga, who has scored at least 20 goals over the past three seasons, threw up his hands in disbelief.
Los Angeles just missed out on a highlight-reel goal in the 41st. Hamilton, Ont.’s Ryan Raposo sent a fine ball into the area that was headed down by Marky Delgado into the path of Nathan Ordaz. Ordaz immediately executed a Cruyff turn to shake off Timo Baumgartl and then rifled a low drive off of the far post. The rebound ricocheted off of the back of goalkeeper Roman Burki, but it was quickly shepherded by Jaziel Orozco into his ‘keeper’s arms.
The home side finally found a breakthrough in the 73rd. St. Louis was working the ball forward from the back when Daniel Edelman’s errant pass was picked off by Choinière. The former CF Montreal midfielder streaked forward and used Baugarmtl as a screen to fool Burki and drag a low shot through the defender’s legs and inside the far post to make it 1-0. With the goal, Choinière tied his entire output in 10 games for LAFC in 2025.
Under 10 minutes later, he would make it two during another period of sustained pressure for LAFC. After Tyler Boyd’s effort from distance was deflected, Edelman headed away, but only as a far as Choinière a little over 20 yards out. He once again ran forward and, like he did on his first goal, used SLC defenders as a screen to drag another low shot past Burki, who caught it just too late to making the diving save, to make it 2-0 in the 81st.
Only four matches into the 2026 season, Choinière needs only three more goals to match his MLS-high of five, scored in 2023 as a member of CFMTL. While offence is not normally part of Choinière’s game, Canada manager Jesse Marsch will undoubtedly be impressed with his performance this past weekend.
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Janine Sonis (née Beckie), Denver Summit
Janine Sonis’s afternoon started out well, but it didn’t end that way as the expansion Denver Summit took to the pitch for their inaugural match in San Jose to take on Bay FC as the 2026 National Women’s Soccer League season opened play. Sonis, whose parents are Canadian, was actually born and raised in the Denver suburbs. An NWSL vet of seven seasons with the Houston Dash, Sky Blue (now Gotham) FC, Portland Thorns and Racing Louisville, Sonis wore the captain’s armband for Denver’s first match. Her Canada teammate, Sydney Collins, captained the home side.
Before the game was 10 minutes old, the hosts were ahead. United States U-20 forward Alex Pfeiffer was the beneficiary of a friendly deflection from Summit defender Kaleigh Kurtz. She latched onto the ball, streaked down the right, cut inside and beat Abby Smith to make it 1-0 in the eighth. Pfeiffer was full value for the goal, but she was given too much room to operate by the Summit backline.
The expansion team evened matters in the 20th with their first-ever goal and Sonis played a hand in it. Getting a step on Collins on the left, Sonis squared a ball on the edge of the six-yard box for Melissa Kossler. The Germany forward hit with her first touch to beat Jordan Silkowitz for the Summit’s first goal and become the answer to a trivia question.
But Sonis’s elation turned into regret in short order. Just seven minutes after the goal, her afternoon was over. Sonis’s pass to Carson Pickett was intercepted and Bay attempted to start moving the other way. With Pfeiffer set to receive a pass, Sonis lunged in with a late tackle and a high boot, catching the 18-year-old forward. Sonis immediately knew she was in trouble and signalled that she didn’t mean to catch her that high. Referee Nabil Bensalah issued a yellow card, but received a call in his headset to head for the VAR monitor for a check. After consulting with the monitor, Bensalah upgraded it to a straight red and Sonis was off in the 27th.
The hosts quickly made the Summit pay for the red card. Much like she did on the first goal, Pfeiffer cut inside the area and attempted to shoot with her preferred left foot. Her effort was blocked, but she got it right back. Seeing her shooting lane cut off, Pfeiffer dished to Joelle Anderson at the penalty spot. The Pepperdine product’s shot took a deflection that fooled Smith as BFC retook the lead at 2-1 in the 31st. They wouldn’t relinquish it and the scoreline held, denying the Summit their first-ever win.
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Ali Ahmed, Norwich City
Norwich City supporters have complicated feelings about the city of Toronto these days. On the one hand, they still have deep anger towards the now-departed Josh Sargent and Toronto FC’s role in his acrimonious and protracted exit from the Canaries. On the other, January addition and Toronto native Ali Ahmed has been everything Norwich City could ask for in his first two-plus months with the club.
Since his arrival at Carrow Road, Norwich has won eight of 10 Championship matches that in which Ahmed has featured. After what looked like an impending relegation battle as 2025 turned into 2026, the Canaries are now closer to the playoff places than they are to the drop zone. Norwich made it four straight league wins on Saturday as Preston North End paid a visit.
It was actually the other Canadian in the match who nearly opened the scoring in the early stages of the match. Lewis Dobbin launched a long ball forward for Daniel Jebbison. Canaries defender Harry Darling was there to try to head back to Vladan Kovacevic, but Jebbison got to it first ahead of the ‘keeper. Knowing that he had very little time and space, he attempted to chip it over Kovacevic, but ended up pulling his effort outside the near post. In fairness to Jebbison, scoring from that particular ball was a very difficult ask. Still, only minutes later, the Canaries would make PNE rue Jebbison’s missed opportunity.
The Canaries worked out from the back with a Kenny McLean ball flicked forward with a deft backheel by Anis Ben Slimane into the path of Matias Kvistgaarden. The Denmark forward ran at goal and unleashed a low drive that was parried away by the diving Daniel Iversen. But Ahmed outraced Odeluga Offiah to the rebound and poked home into the empty net to make it 1-0 in the 17th. The goal was the 25-year-old Ahmed’s fourth Championship marker of the season with his goals total in 68 MLS matches with the Vancouver Whitecaps now eclipsed in England in only his 11th league game.
Scotland midfielder McLean, making his 275 league appearance for the Canaries, would add a second in the 31st and it was all Norwich needed to pick up the three points and maintain its fine run of form. With the victory, Philippe Clement’s team moved into 12th on 51 points and 12 points clear of Oxford United and the drop. More interestingly, though, the Canaries are now nine back of sixth-place Wrexham for the final playoff spot with nine matches to play.
