Football
ESPN staff 7y

Montreal Impact's Patrice Bernier not looking to retire after playoff defeat

Montreal Impact captain Patrice Bernier said he's not ready to retire after his season ended with Wednesday's Eastern Conference final defeat to Toronto FC.

Bernier is a Montreal native and has been with the club since it joined MLS in 2012. The 37-year-old said he hopes  to remain with the Impact in 2017.

"I don't know, I'm not going to talk about it now," Bernier said of his future. "We'll see in the next few weeks, talking with the club. I still feel I've got a lot. This is home so I think that's what pushes me to play even more, but we'll see.

"We'll see at the end of the season how it goes with the club, but personally I do feel I've got more to give."

The Impact pushed the second leg of the conference final to extra time before eventually losing 7-5 on aggregate, and Bernier looked on the positive side after the season came to an end.

"I'm just sad for this team because we battled a lot of adversity," Bernier said. "Nobody saw us here, nobody. Nobody could say -- all the predictions, even when we beat teams, they still picked us last.

"So nobody saw us here, and we got here. And last year, they didn't see, we did well, we did better than last year, and this club will be back here in the future, that's for sure."

Bernier also said owner Joey Saputo told the Impact to be proud of what they had accomplished by reaching the conference final.

"He just said that at this stage there's no worries but we fought hard and that he was very proud, and that we will learn from this and we will keep going and we're going to take this as a lesson to build to get here again," Bernier said.

Star forward Didier Drogba has already announced he is leaving the team, but Impact coach Mauro Biello agreed that the club could return even stronger next season.

"Guys are down in the dressing room. It's grueling out there,'' Biello said. "Today was a tough game, a lot of emotions in playoffs, it's a long season, and in the end the players gave everything, all the way to the end. It's a tough moment, for sure, for everyone, when you're so close and falling short. But we'll be back, and we'll be even stronger."

^ Back to Top ^