PORTLAND, Maine — Portland Hearts of Pine announced Tuesday that the soccer team has signed its first player.
Michel Poon-Angeron, 23, is the first signing in club history, pending league and federation approval. The team begins its inaugural season in the spring of 2025.
The Trinidad and Tobago native most recently competed for the Trinidad and Tobago Premier Football League's AC Port of Spain (AC POS) in a pair of stints in 2023 and 2024, according to a press release on the USL League One website.
Poon-Angeron won the league title and the Trinidad and Tobago League Cup with AC POS in 2024. In addition to league play, the midfielder appeared in seven Concacaf Caribbean Cup matches for the club, the release stated.
"Hearts fans can look forward to a very measured, all-action, energetic midfielder," Poon-Angeron said in the release. "I am excited to help win games and put smiles on the faces of the fans."
Poon-Angeron has also made 17 appearances for the Trinidad and Tobago national team across Concacaf Nations League, FIFA World Cup qualification, and international friendly play. He made his senior national team debut in a friendly against the United States on Jan. 31, 2021, and most recently appeared as a substitute for the Soca Warriors on Dec. 17, 2024, in a friendly against Saudi Arabia.
Last month, Portland Hearts of Pine named Bobby Murphy as its head coach. Murphy comes to Maine after coaching St. Louis CITY2, the reserve team of the Major League Soccer franchise St. Louis City SC. He also spent time with MLS team Orlando City SC and briefly coached the men’s soccer team at the University of Southern Maine.
In his new role, Murphy faces the challenge of both coaching a new team and making a new team to coach. No players or assistant coaches have been signed yet.
“The obvious challenges are filling out a staff and a roster,” Murphy said. “I’m about people first. I want good people around me; I want smart people around me. I want determined, hungry people around me, whether those are players or staff.”
Murphy also sees his duties as going beyond strictly soccer, with the Hearts of Pine seeking to establish a strong cultural following in Portland and across the state.
“Our goal is to become part of the fabric of the community of Portland,” Murphy said. “This place has a buzz to it, you know? It has a vibe to it, and I think it's really exciting that we can hopefully tap into that.”
The team held a Mainers-only tryout on Dec. 7, with about 100 players from across the state taking part in drills and scrimmages. Only a select number of players from that tryout got the chance to move on to the next round of open tryouts on Dec. 13.
The team has not yet made any further roster announcements.
To prepare for the upcoming season, upgrades totaling $2.5 million are going into Fitzpatrick Stadium between December this year and February 2025.
