It’s been a long time since Toronto FC president Bill Manning experienced an autumn without being in the post-season.

In his seven years as president of Real Salt Lake, Manning’s club reached the playoffs every season, winning the MLS Cup in 2009 and reaching the final again in 2013. Fast forward to his current position, and Manning watched as the Reds fell flat in the 2015 play-in game, lost to the Seattle Sounders on penalties in the 2016 final, and avenged that loss by winning the franchise’s first MLS Cup a year later.

Neither Manning, a two-time MLS executive of the year, nor anyone at TFC expected to be watching as Atlanta United won the league title this season, six weeks after the Reds wrapped up their dismal regular season.

Toronto opened the 2018 season hoping to continue the momentum of winning everything there was to win in 2017. They were ready to chase the numbers set by the Los Angeles Galaxy (a combined nine MLS Cups and Supporters’ Shields) and D.C. United (eight).

“It’s more than a thought — it’s the motivation,” Toronto FC captain Michael Bradley said, just days before the regular season kicked off. “At this point, it’s what’s driving us on from here.”

In addition, the team was hopeful of becoming the first MLS club to win the CONCACAF Champions League. And, for a while, that dream looked like it could become a reality. The Reds battled through a tough campaign that saw them face the Colorado Rapids, Tigres UANL and Club America before reaching the final against Chivas Guadalajara in late April. But in the final, midfielder Marky Delgado skied last-minute shot in front of an open net with the score deadlocked 3-3 on aggregate, then Bradley and midfielder Jonathan Osorio, Toronto’s most consistent players, missed their chances in the shootout to give Chivas the Champions League title.

The Reds, meanwhile, had gone 1-4 in MLS play while they juggled both competitions and, while that seemed a deficit a team with the likes of Bradley, Sebastian Giovinco, Jozy Altidore and Victor Vazquez could overcome, they never got on track. Toronto finished 10-18-6 and a distant ninth in the Eastern Conference. They did win another Canadian championship, securing a spot in next year’s Champions League, but that was a rare bright spot.

Manning expects the club to be back among the top teams this coming season. He’s hopeful that five years from now, the lost season of 2018 will be nothing more than a blip.

“I don’t think any one of us anticipated it,” he said.

A barrage of injuries — to Altidore, Vazquez, defenders Drew Moor, Chris Mavinga and Justin Morrow, among other — affected Toronto’s consistency. The Reds used 33 players in 47 games in 2018 compared to 28 players in 44 games in 2016 and 27 players in 43 games in 2016. Their biggest off-season signing, midfielder Ager Aketxe, didn’t work out and was loaned to Cadiz CF, a second division side in Spain, in July and is now off TFC’s books.

Manning admitted the team wasn’t prepared for the onslaught of injuries. “We truly thought we had the depth and we could handle it and we didn’t,” he said.

Two areas to improve on, Manning says, are consistency and the integration of new players, like former D.C. United winger Nick DeLeon, selected in the December expansion draft.

“We have such a solid core of players, it’s not like we need (new players) to be on the field immediately, playing 90 minutes every game,” he said. “We can build them into the team and how we want to play.”

Over the past two seasons, Toronto has parted ways with 10 players who played at least 12 games or more in their final season with the team. That list could grow to 11 if Canadian striker Tosaint Ricketts doesn’t sign a new deal after his option was declined.

Among that group of 10 let go were the likes of veterans Steven Beitashour, Will Johnson and Benoit Cheyrou, and Manning would like to replace some of that veteran leadership. The club plans to be aggressive in free agency this off-season.

“We want to bring in guys that are professionals, guys that have been there, guys that have won championships. So we’re going to be pretty active here and almost hearken back a little bit to 2015-16 when we brought in Will and Drew and Steven,” he said.

Toronto will transition to a younger squad at some point — likely beginning when the designated player contracts of Bradley, 31, Giovinco, 31, and Altidore, 29, are up at the end of 2019 — but now is not that time, Manning said. Instead, the club will pay closer attention to a minute count, particularly for players 30 and over.

“We want to win now,” Manning said. “If you look at the group of players we have and their ages, we’re set to win now. That’s really important for this group of players right now — they have a window of opportunity to win and we see it.”

To do so, Manning wants his team to get back to the singular focus that defined this squad in 2016 and 2017, rather than letting distractions affect them like this past season.

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“You deal with these little distractions and these outside things, but don’t ever let it (detract from) what we’re trying to do, which is win,” Manning said.

He remains confident that the core of this year’s squad is the right group to get Toronto back on track.

“We do well when our backs are against the wall,” he said. “We’ve got something to prove in 2019.”

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