Elias Posted May 10, 2005 Share Posted May 10, 2005 Since it seems like everybody (including me) complains about the state of pro soccer in this country, I want to know what people think success in Canadian pro soccer would mean. EDIT: I just want to clarify this part: Would success mean... - the number of people in the stands (i.e. 20 000 a game) - Canada winning the World Cup - developing players for top European leagues - the number of sustainable clubs - the money players make - the amount of fan interest - the number of Canadian and foreign internationals playing here ...or whatever else... I don't really want this to turn into an other fantasy league or Toronto MLS is amazing/evil thread. I guess my main question is, what is the main goal and the end result people want to see? And what would make people stop complaining? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FC Beast Posted May 10, 2005 Share Posted May 10, 2005 A league that doesn't fall apart after beginning opertions, A league that does not go to markets that fail on a regular basis(edmonton/calgary), and one that can get a decent tv deal, that they don't have to pay themselves. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bettermirror Posted May 10, 2005 Share Posted May 10, 2005 nationwide. 1 team in every province - minimum. with regional feeder leagues where reserve teams can play. regularly televised on tsn, sportsnet, the score. no failure! players get paid minimum 45000. stadium of 8-12000. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bettermirror Posted May 10, 2005 Share Posted May 10, 2005 let me add: i also think 3-4 teams in the mls would be successful as well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FC Beast Posted May 10, 2005 Share Posted May 10, 2005 quote:Originally posted by bettermirror let me add: i also think 3-4 teams in the mls would be successful as well. Toronto ,Montreal, and Vacouver would be 3, who would be the fourth? Please don't say Edmonton or Calgary. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aussoccerfan Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 quote:Originally posted by FC Beast Toronto ,Montreal, and Vacouver would be 3, who would be the fourth? HALIFAX ??? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJT Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 quote:Originally posted by Elias Since it seems like everybody complains about the state of pro soccer in this country, I want to know what people think success in Canadian pro soccer would mean. For me it's one step at a time. A true national championship, even involving only our existing USL D1 teams, would make me happy as a start. Then we work from there. P.S. I like this thread. It's something different that we haven't really talked about before, not explicitly anyway. As Elias said, let's stay on topic. I'm going to delete posts that stray too far off topic. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FC Beast Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 quote:Originally posted by DJT For me it's one step at a time. A true national championship, even involving only our existing USL D1 teams, would make me happy as a start. Then we work from there. P.S. I like this thread. It's something different that we haven't really talked about before, not explicitly anyway. As Elias said, let's stay on topic. I'm going to delete posts that stray too far off topic. Is 3 teams enough for a national championship? Ok the 3 USL Clubs play for the voyaguers trophy, a bragging rights sort of thing,but having a 3 team national champioship is a bit thin. Unless you add the clubs from the CPSL, put all the names in hat, each round over 2 legs, although could the Hamilton Thunder travel out to Vancouver to play the whitecaps? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
devioustrevor Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 I agree with the 'starting small' idea. Starting a National League up from scratch will kill it right away. Having to travel from Vancouver to Halifax is too much to ask for what would be a league that starts on shoestring finances. It would be like a team in Berlin having to play Leauge games in Bangalore. It would just be too much. A better idea would be to have about 4 modest regional leagues with the top 1-2 teams from each regional league taking part in a Champions League-like competition. If approached cautiously with perhaps 10 teams in each league comprising a 36 game schedule with average ticket prices of about $10. When I say a modest league I truly mean it. At an average price of $10 a ticket clubs would still have to average about 5600 fans a game to generate $1M for the regular season. Also, I don't think TV would be much of a problem. We have three 24-hour Sports Channels in this country and they all need to meet the 35% Canadian Content Quotient, so they'd be more than happy to televise games. As a revenue source it would take time to be of significant benefit to teams. Also, nationalism would have to take a back-seat to financial reality. Canada's best players are always going to go overseas and for economic reasons a potential league would have to be viewed mostly as a showcase for Canadians. This could be helpful though for the teams as they'd be able to collect the transfer fees associated with players going overseas. Teams would also have to consider alignment deals where for a negotiated fee allied European teams would always get the rights of first refusal over players developed by teams. Some may disagree with these views and say we should be doing whatever necessary to keep our players here so that they are more easily available for the National Team, but because of the general indifference Canadians have to soccer a professional league here in Canada would probably be nothing more than a minor league to develop players to play in Europe, but this shouldn't be viewed as a negative. There are only about a dozen magnet leagues in Europe with the rest basically existing to develop players to feed into those leagues. Some of those 'feeder' leagues qualify for the World Cup and Canada doesn't. That itself should be a good enough example of the benefits of having such a modest pro league. Africa is a great example, most African nations (perhaps even all of them) have pro leagues that are little more than a tool to develop youngsters. South Africa and Egypt are probably the only two that have leagues capable of being magnet leagues in Africa with the rest being mostly just feeders. Countries like Nigeria, Cameroon and Senegal seem to be doing just fine on the international stage though. Modest That is the word that must always be the first consideration when starting up a League here in Canada. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DoyleG Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 Success in Canadian Pro Soccer: 1) 8 team Canadian National League to start with 2) Canada Open Cup 3) Reformed provincial leagues that can act as feeders into the national league Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daniel Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 Success for me is making the WC. Everything is contingent on that. Look at the CSL post-86. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RealGooner Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 We might want to look at the Brazilian model. Each state has its own league chanpionship,i.e Sao Paulo, Rio, Goias, Minas Gerais. The top clubs from each state then come together for a shortened Brazilian championship. So this is not a new idea, Brazil is a geographically vast nation just like Canada and havingstate level rather than national leagues has not hurt Brazil. In Canada we could have for example, the best teams from the CPSL compete with the USL teams for a short knockout championship. Thus we can crown a national champion each year without having to deal with the problems of having to run a national league in a geographically huge country that isnt ready for one. The Championship could be a good way to create Canadian rivalries and guage public interest without the outlay of a full league. Once sufficient interest is built the full league can be rolled out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RealGooner Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 We might want to look at the Brazilian model. Each state has its own league chanpionship,i.e Sao Paulo, Rio, Goias, Minas Gerais. The top clubs from each state then come together for a shortened Brazilian championship. So this is not a new idea, Brazil is a geographically vast nation just like Canada and havingstate level rather than national leagues has not hurt Brazil. In Canada we could have for example, the best teams from the CPSL compete with the USL teams for a short knockout championship. Thus we can crown a national champion each year without having to deal with the problems of having to run a national league in a geographically huge country that isnt ready for one. The Championship could be a good way to create Canadian rivalries and guage public interest without the outlay of a full league. Once sufficient interest is built the full league can be rolled out. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJT Posted May 11, 2005 Share Posted May 11, 2005 quote:Originally posted by RealGooner We might want to look at the Brazilian model. Each state has its own league chanpionship,i.e Sao Paulo, Rio, Goias, Minas Gerais. The top clubs from each state then come together for a shortened Brazilian championship. That's not exactly how it works. There are three levels to the Brazilian national league with promotion and relegation. Teams get into the lowest level based on state competition (championship or cup) performance, and then there is promotion and relegation between the three levels on an annual basis (therefore, the teams you see at the top level are not there because of state competition performance, but rather based on national league performance in the previous year). And the national league is anything but "shortened": the top two levels have 22 teams each (42 matches each) and the third level has even more (multiple groups and phases). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RealGooner Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 DJT, thats fine and dandy, but you are missing the point, which is not to completly replicate the Brazilian set up. It is rather to loosely follow the Brazilian pattern, which is to have a national set up in which regional competition takes place every year before a national one. This is not done in Europe, the region most Canadians tend to look to for inspiration. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Luis_Rancagua Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 What are the chances of revisiting the whole debate on the CUSL??? There were some interested ideas there, in particular about an Open-Cup Championship. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DJT Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 quote:Originally posted by RealGooner DJT, thats fine and dandy, but you are missing the point, which is not to completly replicate the Brazilian set up. It is rather to loosely follow the Brazilian pattern, which is to have a national set up in which regional competition takes place every year before a national one. This is not done in Europe, the region most Canadians tend to look to for inspiration. No, I'm not missing the point. I wasn't commenting on Canada. I was just correcting your description of the Brazilian setup. Essentially I agree with what you are proposing. I have said that we should focus on building a national cup, in which there would first be regional competitions (whether using existing ones (eg. CPSL, PCSL, provincial leagues, etc.) or creating news ones) and then the winners would meet in a national tournament at the end. As I mentioned above, to begin with I'm happy enough starting with just the USL D1 clubs (so no regional competitions at first). I just don't view this as being analogous to Brazil, because Brazil still does have a national league that is actually bigger than those in Europe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest HamiltonSteelers Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 Success would be any system that keeps kids playing the game past the age of 18 at a high level of competition and could throw a few bob in the pocket. - We'll say 5000 per game, 12 team league or - 2000 per game, four regional leagues with a 'champions league' style tournament for the top 2 clubs from each regional league. - A system that the regional and provincial associations get behind - Training facilities to be built as either part of the stadium or separate - Marketing scheme that emphasizes national spirit and growth as a soccer playing nation - More friendlies/WCQ on domestic soil in more than one or two grounds. - Keep university-aged players playing in Canada by paying their education (i.e. scholarship) to play for the clubs - minimum 4 U-21 players must be on the first team roster - Qualifying for the World Cup would be proof of a success Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MM2 Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 I would like to bring a different twist to this discussion, the question being what would be considered success for a pro (soccer) organization in Canada. As fanatics of Canadian Soccer we tend to spend a lot of time Navel gazing. Let's look outside for a minute at the "success" of some other sports. Hockey: NHL, forgetting the strike, highly successful (failures Quebec and Winnipeg gone, Ottawa franchise bankrupt.-saved by Melnyk) Canadian Junior Hockey enjoying a boom. Baseball: Montreal gone, Ottawa Lynx,(probably gone after this year) numerous AA and A franchises have diasappeared. Canadian Baseball league didn't even last a year. Toronto Blue Jays -Attendance problems. Northern League?? CFL: After losing and re-gaining Montreal and Ottawa, seems to be enjoying a re-surgence. Basketball: Lost an NBA franchise in Vancouver. Didn't we have a league that failed and a few minor league teams in US leagues that are gone? Lacrosse: Success in Toronto and Calgary, several other franchises gone, Montreal, Ottawa, any others? Limited Schedule Rugby: A National league. but as I understand a very limited schedule: Roller Hockey: :D Did I forget anything? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aussoccerfan Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 quote:Originally posted by MM2 Baseball:Northern League?? Winnipeg gets good fan support and Calgary & Edmonton have teams this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aussoccerfan Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 quote:Originally posted by MM2 Baseball:Northern League?? Winnipeg gets good fan support and Calgary & Edmonton have teams this year. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffymac1971 Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 Success in Canadian Soccer in general is to turf dorf...oops I mean Kevan Pipe! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jeffymac1971 Posted May 12, 2005 Share Posted May 12, 2005 Success in Canadian Soccer in general is to turf dorf...oops I mean Kevan Pipe! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LMW Posted May 14, 2005 Share Posted May 14, 2005 quote:Originally posted by Elias Since it seems like everybody (including me) complains about the state of pro soccer in this country, I want to know what people think success in Canadian pro soccer would mean. EDIT: I just want to clarify this part: Would success mean... - the number of people in the stands (i.e. 20 000 a game) - Canada winning the World Cup - developing players for top European leagues - the number of sustainable clubs - the money players make - the amount of fan interest - the number of Canadian and foreign internationals playing here ...or whatever else... I don't really want this to turn into an other fantasy league or Toronto MLS is amazing/evil thread. I guess my main question is, what is the main goal and the end result people want to see? And what would make people stop complaining? Start off with a 10 team league with a team in each province. Need a television contract ie. sportsnet, TSN (prefer sportsnet). Need advertising Need a nice decent stadium to hold 15,000 to 25,000 people, soccer specific would be good. Need a quality product on the field. Initially you would have to have at least a 4 to 5 foreigner limit on the field for each team to bring up the level of play so people would come to watch. Other 6 to 7 players on each team on the field would be Canadian. Need each club to have reserve and youth teams Each club should follow the european model of training and fitness for all levels. You would need owners that were committed to a 5 to 10 year plan to get the league an identity and to bring up the level of play on the field. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MM2 Posted May 14, 2005 Share Posted May 14, 2005 quote:You would need owners that were committed to a 5 to 10 year plan to get the league an identity and to bring up the level of play on the field Absolutely, ownership is the key, the league would need owners with a solid business plan that doesn't overestimate revenues and underestimate expenses and who would be committed to absorbing losses 5-10 years. Next, a quality league management team, with the ability to evaluate potential owners and markets and weed out those who would fold after one to two years. On field talent would be next, with a attendance in the 4-5,000 range. Otherwise I agree with most of the points in previous posts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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