Homecoming for Froese
One of the finest talents produced on a Manitoban soccer pitch has returned home.
Kianz Froese, the Cuban-born and Winnipeg-raised attacking midfielder, agreed to a contract with Valour FC, the city's Canadian Premier League side, on Wednesday.
The deal secures the 29-year-old for the remainder of the season, with an option for the club to bring him back in 2026.
MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS
Cuban-born, Winnipeg-raised midfielder Kianz Froese signed with the Winnipeg's Valour FC on Wednesday.
'I think he's one of the best players that Manitoba has produced,' said an excited head coach and GM Phillip Dos Santos, who first crossed paths with Froese as a teenager on the youth national team. Valour's goalkeeper coach, Patrick Di Stefani, coached Froese during their time with Manitoba's provincial program.
'He has a track record that — for any young Manitoba player — you look at and say, 'Man, I would like to have a career like the one he's had,'' Dos Santos added. 'And he's young, he's 29, he still has very good years ahead of him.'
Froese hasn't played at home since he was 16.
He's spent the last seven years playing professionally in Germany, where his mettle was tested while playing in the country's lower divisions with Fortuna Düsseldorf II, FC Saarbrücken, TSV Havelse and SV Wehen Wiesbaden.
'Hard,' Froese, who netted 32 goals in 190 matches, said of his time in Germany. 'It's a hard thing when you go abroad and get used to Germany as a culture. Extremely different. I mean, Canadians are extremely nice when you think about the culture and the way they treat you, and there, I think it's very demanding, in terms of sport, in terms of pressure — they are on it when it comes to sports.
'I had to adapt to that at the start. Then I got used to it. And then, obviously, at some point I didn't really remember it, but now I'm able to reflect back and say, 'Hey, look at the differences,' so it's kind of like a reflective time period right now for me.'
Froese was a sensation as a young player in the Garden City area. It didn't take long for him to earn the attention of evaluators at the provincial and national level, as he later went on to play for Team Manitoba and take part in the National Training Camp (NTC) program.
At 16, he joined the Vancouver Whitecaps Academy and quickly ascended through the ranks to make his professional debut in Major League Soccer in 2014. At 19, Froese made his debut with the Canadian men's national team in a friendly against Ghana, the first of two international caps he's earned.
Now he returns to the place where it all started, with a wealth of experience behind him.
'I think it's nice to be in a familiar environment,' said Froese, who had offers to continue playing in Germany last year but decided to go back to Cuba. 'That's just part of who I am, in a sense, and even if I don't remember everything, I still feel that being back where I grew up, where I spent those early years, formative years of my life, is just a nice thing for me.'
This was the right time for him to join a new club. If he didn't do it now, he said, it's unlikely he would've ever returned to the pitch.
'That's sort of the main point, and the reason why I chose Valour over whatever else I could have done, because that's kind of what I'm looking for.'
Froese is exactly what Valour needs right now. Dos Santos credited him with possessing a level of decision-making and 'game intelligence' in the final third that the club is looking for.
MIKAELA MACKENZIE / FREE PRESS
Winnipeg Valour's head coach Phillip Dos Santos has high hopes that midfielder Kianz Froese (centre) will be the boost the club needs to climb in the Canadian Premier League standings.
Winnipeg's side is once again struggling for offensive production. Valour, which currently sits seventh in a table of eight teams at 2-6-2, has nine goals in eight matches this season, tied with Vancouver FC for the second-fewest behind Pacific FC.
'Everyone sees it,' said Dos Santos. 'I think the common observer could see that. We were looking at our last five league games, where you outshoot the opposition… (but) there's actually an opportunity to maybe get in and put a teammate into closer spaces. So I think that he's a player that's going to give us that. He's a player that's gonna read those moments and increase the quality that we could have in those positions.'
This will be Froese's debut season in the CPL.
He is perhaps the biggest homegrown player that fans can cheer for since his once-close friend Marco Bustos, who scored seven times in Valour's inaugural season, then fled to West Coast rival Pacific.
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'Quality. Clarity in the final third. Explosiveness in space. We're not talking about straight-line fast here, we're talking about football fast. Experience — so many things,' Dos Santos said of Froese. 'Definition, goals, assists — but again, there's a process and the process is that it's still a player that's going to need time to get rhythm.'
Dos Santos said it will be 'a few weeks' before Froese dons Valour's colours in a match. His last game action was July 2024, so the first step is re-establishing his conditioning for a 90-minute contest.
'He's almost going through a pre-season right now, so we're gonna take our time with him and make sure we have a healthy fit, and that he's ready when he's gonna step on the field for the first day,' Dos Santos said.
Valour hosts second-place Forge FC (5-5-0) at Princess Auto Stadium on Sunday (3:30 p.m.).
joshua.frey-sam@freepress.mb.ca
Joshua Frey-SamReporter
Josh Frey-Sam reports on sports and business at the Free Press. Josh got his start at the paper in 2022, just weeks after graduating from the Creative Communications program at Red River College. He reports primarily on amateur teams and athletes in sports. Read more about Josh.
Every piece of reporting Josh produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print — part of the Free Press's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.
Our newsroom depends on a growing audience of readers to power our journalism. If you are not a paid reader, please consider becoming a subscriber.
Our newsroom depends on its audience of readers to power our journalism. Thank you for your support.
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