League president: Joe Piccininni
League secretary: Ivan Habus
Referees
Referees: Paul Avis (Rexdale, Ontario) and Stan Tait (Montreal, Quebec).
Clubs and players
Homer was a largely Greek team, featuring three national team players from Greece. Goalkeeper Nikos Christidis was signed from Aris. From 1964 to 1978 he played in 29 international games for Greece. Themis Rigas was signed from A.O. Kavalas. They also signed Athanasios Intzoglou, formerly of Ethnikos and Panionios, who had just been banned for life after having taken a bribe to not play well in a cup game in Greece.
Before the season started Montreal Cantalia hired Ottavio Cucuraghi as player-coach. After a disastrous start to the season, with just five points from 11 matches, Cucuraghi was replaced by Salvatore Italiano. Italiano had been coaching local Montreal teams for the past years. The directors also brought in four players from an Italian third-division team. In addition, they signed former Toronto Metros player Felix Angel. Returning players included Aldo DeSimone and Paolo Ferrante.
Polonia strengthened their team by signing several players from the Stal Rzeszòw club in Poland.
Newly-formed Quebec Selects was a club made up of the best amateur players in the Quebec area.
With the suspension of Zeljko Bilecki for the whole season Toronto Croatia added two new goalkeepers in Zeljko Poleto and Darko Grisbaher. Poleto was a former Dinamo Zagreb youth player. Croatia also signed Miralem Fazlic and Alberto Altarac from the Sloboda club in Yugoslavia. Ibrahim Arslanovic returned to boss the midfield and Goran Peric again led the attack.
Toronto Hungaria used the name Canadian-Hungarians this season. They were coached by Tom Boljkovac. Hungarian-born players Imre Kily and Tibor Molnar were key players, as was veteran NSL-player Dave Thomson. John Fahy did much of the goalscoring before he was sold to Toronto Italia.
Toronto Italia hired Franco Gallina, formerly of Montreal Cantalia, as player-coach before the start of the season. In addition they signed experienced players like Pedro Kozak from Serbian White Eagles and Francisco Montero from Toronto Croatia. They also had young Canadian players like Robert Iarusci, Carmine Marcontonio and 18-year old Carmilo Barbieri.
Review of the season
The opening game of the 1974 NSL season was played on Sunday April 21 between Toronto Croatia and Toronto Hungaria. A crowd of 5,000 watched Croatia win 3-1 at C.N.E. Stadium.
Some of the other teams in the league kicked of it’s 1974 season Tuesday April 23. In Toronto Momcilo Stojanovic scored the only goal of the game when Serbian White Eagles defeated Polonia 1-0. In St. Catharines Chris Conlon scored on a penalty kick to give Hamilton City a 1-0 win over the Heidelberg club. Hamilton Italo-Canadians defeated Melita 2-1 in Hamilton.
On Saturday April 27 St. Catharines Heidelberg defeated Ottawa Tigers 2-0 in St. Catharines. Dan McIntosh and Siegfried Wiebe scored for Heidelberg and goalkeeper Sam Buccitelli got the shutout.
On May 18 Quebec Selects and Hamilton Italo-Canadians played to a 1-1 tie at Jarry Park. The Selects had an average age of 19 and a half years. James Corsi scored for Quebec.
On Friday June 7, Serbian White Eagles defeated Kitchener Srbija 16-1. Momcilo Stojanovic scored eight goals. The highest score in the NSL was recorded in 1965 when Toronto Ukraina beat Toronto Macedonia 18-1.
Serbian White Eagles won the league championship.
Toronto Croatia won the league playoff final.
Toronto Italia won the league cup.
Results
May 19, 1974 Toronto
Attendance:
Serbian White Eagles 1
Toronto Homer 1
June 9, 1974
Attendance:
Toronto Macedonia 5 (Chede Avremovski 2, Jerko Apostoloviski, Angel Naten, Vasil Anasosovski)
Ottawa Tigers 1 (Erzo Ozerding)
June 9, 1974 Toronto
Attendance:
First Portuguese 1 (Manuel Santos)
Serbian White Eagles 1 (Branko Bogdanovic)
June 9, 1974
Attendance:
Toronto Ukraina 0
Hamilton City 0
June 9, 1974 Montreal
Attendance:
Quebec Selects 2 (Mike Reynolds, Chris Horrocks)
Toronto Italia 3 (Franco Gallina, Saban Romanovic, Pasquale Pierantonio)
July 14, 1974 CNE Stadium, Toronto*
Attendance: 9,000
Referee: Paul Avis
Serbian White Eagles 1
Toronto Homer 0
*Match abandoned after 63 minutes when spectators ran onto the field.
July 27, 1974 Jarry Park, Montreal
Attendance:
Quebec FC
Hamilton Croatia
Standings
Leading goalscorer Gls Ass Pts
1. Momcilo Stojanovic (White Eagles) 54 12 120
Top goalkeeper Min. Svs GA SO GAA.
1. Blajoe Tamindzic (White Eagles) 28
National Soccer League Playoffs
Playoffs quarter-finals
October 6, 1974
Serbian White Eagles 3 (Momcilo Stojanovic 2, John Fahy)
Macedonia 0
October 7, 1974 C.N.E. Stadium, Toronto
Homer 6 (Gus Hatoupis 4, ????)
Hamilton Croatia 0
October 8, 1974 C.N.E. Stadium, Toronto
Toronto Croatia 1 (Marijan Bilic)
First Portuguese 0
after overtime
October 9, 1974
Toronto Italia
Playoffs semi-finals
October 10, 1974 C.N.E. Stadium, Toronto
Toronto Croatia 1 (Alija Solak)
Serbian White Eagles 0
October 15, 1974 C.N.E. Stadium, Toronto
Toronto Italia 1
Homer 2
Playoff final
October 20, 1974 C.N.E. Stadium, Toronto (att: 2,149)
Toronto Croatia 1 (Boris Psaker)
Homer 0
National Soccer League Cup
NSL Cup Final
October 4, 1974
CNE Stadium
First Portuguese 1 (Jorge Felix)
Toronto Italia 0
October 6, 1974
C.N.E. Stadium, Toronto
Toronto Italia 2 (Carmelo Barbieri, Saban Romanovic)
First Portuguese 0
Italia won the two-game total-points series 3-1.
