One versus two. A spot in the CPL Final up for grabs in a summit showdown.
It doesn’t get much better than this in the Canadian Premier League Playoffs. CPL Shield winners Forge FC host Atlético Ottawa at Hamilton Stadium on Sunday in the 2025 Championship Semifinal, where one of the league’s top two sides will book the first ticket to this year’s CPL Final.
The winner of Sunday’s contest will earn the right to host the CPL Final on Nov. 9, and will get next weekend off to prepare. The losing side, however, must drop to the Contender Semifinal on Nov. 1 or 2, where they’ll host either Cavalry FC or York United in a battle for the other remaining spot in the Final.
Hosts Forge, fresh off lifting silverware as regular season winners (for a second straight year), have their sights set on the North Star Cup, and becoming the first CPL team ever to win a double. They’re aiming to qualify for a jaw-dropping seventh consecutive Final, having played in every single championship match so far in the league’s history. Three Finals to date have been played at Hamilton Stadium, and a win on Sunday means Forge would host a fourth.
“You play to win,” Forge coach Bobby Smyrniotis told the media on Friday. “Winning is fun, players love it. So why would you want to do it any other way? It’s something we’ve built here over seven years. The guys understand what that feeling is like, and they push themselves.”
He added: “There’s a direct correlation to having a very good environment within your team, to being successful in the league and winning championships.”
Winning on Sunday is much easier said than done, though, against an Atlético Ottawa side desperate to slay the dragon and bring a CPL Final back to the capital for the first time since 2022. They’ve been neck-and-neck with Forge all year, but fell just short at the end, finishing two points behind the Hammers in the league table.
There wasn’t much to separate these teams this year, but in the end Forge effectively won the trophy because they managed to beat Ottawa at home in mid-August. That was the only one of four matchups between the sides that didn’t finish in a draw, so Atleti still have yet to beat the Hamilton club in 2025.
It’s impossible for Ottawa to win the North Star Cup this year without beating Forge at least once, so that’s goal number one right now.
These two clubs, truly the cream of the crop in the CPL in 2025, will deliver a proper heavyweight bout on Sunday. Forge’s side is replete with experienced postseason veterans, from Kyle Bekker and Tristan Borges to Alessandro Hojabrpour and David Choinière. Ten players in the squad have won multiple championships with the Hammers, and Bekker, Choinière and Alex Achinioti-Jönsson have been present for every trophy in club history.
In total, Forge FC’s roster features 109 games of CPL Playoff experience — 101 of them with Forge, plus Alessandro Hojabrpour’s five at Pacific and Mo Babouli’s three with York.
