Garber comments on further Cdn. expansion

[Gian-Luca]

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/scorecard/othernews.asp?articleID=240317

"Ottawa made an announcement [Tuesday], and that is very positive," Garber said. "We have met with that group and believe that they are going to put together a terrific plan, one that so far we have been very impressed with, in the time we have spent with Eugene Melnyk and his group."

And Francesco Aquilini, owner of the NHL's Vancouver Canucks, is reportedly interested in investing in a MLS club with USL's Vancouver Whitecaps owner Greg Kerfoot and NBA player Steve Nash.

For any of those three markets to make sense, however, they have to make cents.

"Clearly with Canada we've got to ensure that we can create a Canadian business with national television partners and national sponsors and broad municipal, political and corporate support," Garber said. "We know that we can create the success locally that exists in Toronto, but we need to ensure that are able to transcend simple fan-following into a viable business.

"We are spending time working on that and ensuring that we can go to market with a new approach, which is not just 11 or 13 MLS teams and one Canadian team, but potentially more American teams but even more Canadian teams. That's something we have been working on for the last number of months."

[john tv]

Canadian supporters groups in any of those cities will totally change the face of sports in North America.Toronto is no fluke,just an true representation what we all want and all are capable of. Can't imagine us guys being the only ones. My only concern is the Sun who did a typical and masterful job of trying to eliminate our game. I guess the I told you so is now old hat, but yes the gloves are of.We will see what media will jump on that bandwagon.