TORONTO – Staring down the conclusion to his sixth and potentially final season with the club, Michael Bradley has loved every moment he has spent with Toronto FC.
“It’s been incredible,” said Bradley on Wednesday. “It’s been everything I hoped for.”
“When I came here I was so excited and so motivated for the opportunity, the challenge, of trying to help take a club that had so much potential, in an incredible sports city, and make it different, make it special, unique,” he continued. “A team, a club, that people could be proud of.”
“And we’ve had some, over the last five or six years, incredible days. Unbelievable highs, a few lows sprinkled in there,” he added. “But what would life be if there weren’t a few lows tossed in as well.”
When Bradley joined TFC in January 2014, the club, through their first seven seasons in MLS, had never made the Audi MLS Cup Playoffs. Since his arrival they have reached four of six, including three of the last four MLS Cup Finals, stocked the trophy cabinet with an MLS Cup, a Supporters’ Shield, three more Voyageurs Cups from winning the Canadian Championship, and were penalty kicks away from adding three additional pieces of silverware.
For Bradley and his family, Toronto is “home.”
“Love it, love it,” said the TFC captain of life in Toronto. “At this point it’s home. We’ve been here six years, my daughter was born here, my kids are in school, we live here year round. We love the city, love the people.”
Bradley is out of contract after the season, unless TFC win MLS Cup against the Seattle Sounders at CenturyLink Field on Sunday (3 pm ET | ABC, Univision, TUDN, TVAS, TSN), in which case his current $6.5 million deal will reportedly be picked up, which was further hinted at by Toronto head coach Greg Vanney.
"I’d like to think that there’s going to be a solution and I’d like to think that the solution is us winning [Sunday] and then we know he’s here," Vanney said on Wednesday.
Sunday will be Bradley’s 200th appearance for TFC in all competitions, at the very same spot that he made his first back on March 15, 2014.
It's another chance to pursue that aim in the same manner he has on the previous 199 occasions.
“The biggest pride for me is what the team has been about in the biggest days,” reflected Bradley. “[One] that steps on the field and isn’t fazed by a thing. Fearless, plays, competes. Doesn’t matter who is on the field, who is not on a given day, when those lights come on, we’ve been ready to go for it.”
“We’ve shared some incredible days with our fans. A lot of them at BMO [Field], but there has been a few others as well,” smiled Bradley, listing some of the big away wins TFC have accomplished in recent years – a register that does not, yet, include CenturyLink Field.
“There has been some special moments,” he added. “And to have been a part of all that, that’s why I came.”
