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Canada - Ecuador Game Thread [R]


Lord Bob

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Toronto in the MLS is not the problem, I was as happy as anyone with Toronto hitting the MLS and I was thrilled with BMO field being such a great park, even if it meant my hometown losing games because of it. It's a soccer specific park and it should have been the perfect for home stadium for the nats. But.... Toronto supporting the national team is a huge problem. Thats what this thread is all about. Where were all these "real soccer fans" you're talking about? Christ, gimmee a stadium full of soccer moms wearing read and white, it's better than no support at all. What kind of media support do we get when our boys have to play away games in Toronto? Not really the type of media support we want is it? Grass is great! I'm glad they installed it but it's not the only place to play on grass, is it? I hate Vancouver (the city) and if the Canucks win the cup, I'll die a little inside but I hope to hell they get the bulk of the National team games once they build their stadium... At least until Edmonton builds theirs... lol.

WCQ are coming soon and it's too big a risk to give Toronto another opportunity to make Canadian supporters look bad. I want the World Cup. Most Toronto soccer fans clearly want somebody else there.

Playing games in Toronto scares the hell out of me right now because, outside the fantastic but seriously small hardcores that showed up... I wonder if the city has any Canadian supporters at all. It sure as hell doesn't have very many "real CANADIAN soccer fans"

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This is a process, but it is not a process in Toronto alone. This isn't the Toronto Men's National Soccer team. Any Canadian team that's trying to build its popularity but plays only in one time zone isn't worthy of the term.

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This is a process, but it is not a process in Toronto alone. This isn't the Toronto Men's National Soccer team. Any Canadian team that's trying to build its popularity but plays only in one time zone isn't worthy of the term.

If we play by rotation and only play in any city every 2 or 3 years, kiss it all goodbye.

It has to be Toronto and Montreal in the short term to try and build something.

They have the facilities, potential to support if done right over time, and are convenient for the players travel wise.

It's the over time part that matters the most.

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That goal was a beautiful thing and is the exactly the sort of mentality we need more of. To me that was the biggest positive of the whole match. A winner's mentality, do whatever it takes no matter if it's in the rules or not. Clearly this was within the rules but we are all to often on the other side of these events.

+1

I'm a litte surprised that more people don't want to talk about how GREAT that goal was. I remmeber Sweden doing almost exactly the same thing to the CWNT in the WWC... we were the ones standing around arguing and not paying attention. To see the CMNT have the savvy to play an advantage like that was nearly as satisfying as seeing Dunfield's cracker. It shows we are prepared to do what it takes to win - something we haven't really shown in the past.

As for the support question... it's a bit tricky teasing out the general support from the hard core support. The V's were AWESOME last night. Pure class all the way, no question. However, (and I'm not trying to be antagonistic here) I do have a hard time understanding how our biggest city can be supposedly filled with TFC fans who can't be bothered to come out to support the Canadian team. Where do they all go? How can they care so much about a club team filled with foreign players and so little for a national team with several 'hometown boys'? It just doesn't make sense to me...

Having said that though, playing anywhere in Canada will have its challenges... just different ones. If cities lost the right to host CMNT games, we'd be down to playing in Whitehorse by now...

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If we play by rotation and only play in any city every 2 or 3 years, kiss it all goodbye.

It has to be Toronto and Montreal in the short term to try and build something.

Yeah, if we play games in other cities we might see our sports stations showing Blue Jays games instead of national team friendlies while the fans in attendance are two-thirds cheering for the other team. And that would be awful.

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Toronto in the MLS is not the problem, I was as happy as anyone with Toronto hitting the MLS and I was thrilled with BMO field being such a great park, even if it meant my hometown losing games because of it. It's a soccer specific park and it should have been the perfect for home stadium for the nats. But.... Toronto supporting the national team is a huge problem. Thats what this thread is all about. Where were all these "real soccer fans" you're talking about? Christ, gimmee a stadium full of soccer moms wearing read and white, it's better than no support at all. What kind of media support do we get when our boys have to play away games in Toronto? Not really the type of media support we want is it? Grass is great! I'm glad they installed it but it's not the only place to play on grass, is it? I hate Vancouver (the city) and if the Canucks win the cup, I'll die a little inside but I hope to hell they get the bulk of the National team games once they build their stadium... At least until Edmonton builds theirs... lol.

WCQ are coming soon and it's too big a risk to give Toronto another opportunity to make Canadian supporters look bad. I want the World Cup. Most Toronto soccer fans clearly want somebody else there.

Playing games in Toronto scares the hell out of me right now because, outside the fantastic but seriously small hardcores that showed up... I wonder if the city has any Canadian supporters at all. It sure as hell doesn't have very many "real CANADIAN soccer fans"

See this is where you go wrong with your post. There was a lot of vocal support from Canadian fans (who btw did a great job owning Ecuador fans). Also, you're acting like Toronto is only city in Canada has a problem with supporting CMNT. Other cities had so many chances to support CMNT in the past, but suddenly Toronto is getting bulk of games and we got people here crying murder over it. I like I said before, name me one city that had better support than Toronto in the past?

FYI, Toronto just set a record for CMNT friendly attendance which is good thing because CSA is making money now so they can invest in CMNT more. Also in WCQ, Toronto has proven to support CMNT by outnumbering Jamaican supporters unlike Montreal (Honduras) and Edmonton (Mexico).

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FYI, Toronto just set a record for CMNT friendly attendance which is good thing because CSA is making money now so they can invest in CMNT more. Also in WCQ, Toronto has proven to support CMNT by outnumbering Jamaican supporters unlike Montreal (Honduras) and Edmonton (Mexico).

Disputed.

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Yeah, you guys are marketing geniuses. Let's punish the part that's growing - loud, passionate, organized Canadian support - to a level never seen before at Canada games because you guys watching on TV didn't think it met your standards.
It doesn't take a Norman Einstein to figure out there is a problem, when in a market of 5 million, only 5000 fans show up, to see you play at home to 5000 empty seats and several more thousand cheering for the opposite side. Those Ecuador guys won't be part of what you are trying to build.

Exactly where's the growth? And again before you get defensive, nobody has been criticizing the people there, just the whiny excuse makers of why they can't get near to a decent Canadian supporter turnout ie 20,000.

Ironically, one of my degrees is in marketing but for God's sakes this is common sense.

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It doesn't take a Norman Einstein to figure out there is a problem, when in a market of 5 million, only 5000 fans show up, to see you play at home to 5000 empty seats and several more thousand cheering for the opposite side. Those Ecuador guys won't be part of what you are trying to build.

Exactly where's the growth? And again before you get defensive, nobody has been criticizing the people there, just the whiny excuse makers of why they can't get near to a decent Canadian supporter turnout ie 20,000.

Ironically, one of my degrees is in marketing but for God's sakes this is common sense.

I think you're making two points here but the problem is they don't add up together.

The point about all of the Ecuador fans? Although opposition fans will turn up regardless of where we play, you're right it'll always be at its worst in Toronto. That's fair. Sometimes the calculus just doesn't add up and they should not be playing certain teams in Toronto.

The point about where's the growth? Seriously? Check here http://www.flickr.com/search/show/?q=20110601+fans&w=46765827%40N08 and though I have no doubts they could recreate that (or even best it) in Vancouver, let me know when they get that in Winnipeg or even Edmonton. I remember Cuba ;)

The growth has been phenomenal in Toronto. Anyone who has followed the Nats as long as you or I should easily be able to discern that.

Now that there is a 20 000 seat grass turf stadium the expectations have increased - understandably so! But this idea that all of a sudden the expectation is that cheering Canadians fans are supposed to come out of the woodwork is a bit mystifying, particularly from some of the people who have been around these parts for more than a decade.

Commonwealth barely pulled 15K for a WCQ against Mexico last time around. I'm not sure where your expectations have come from, even Greece didn't get 15 against us at home! In Greece!

I personally think we need to share the Nats as much as possible so I'm not in favour of Toronto-centric approach at all.

But I think it is all priorities. Do we want 14 000 mild supporters and 1000 oppo fans in Commonwealth Stadium or 5000 strong supporters and 10 000 opposition supporters in Toronto? Do we want to go short-term or long-term?

There's no wrong answer. And the answer will change once Vancouver gets turf.

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Yeah, you guys are marketing geniuses. Let's punish the part that's growing - loud, passionate, organized Canadian support - to a level never seen before at Canada games because you guys watching on TV didn't think it met your standards.

THIS

IS

A

PROCESS

Start with the organized groups in the end; grow out from there. The FANS (and the team for once!) just created a ton of new dedicated Canada supporters last night who WILL want to comeback. We're starting to get the flywheel spinning that one day will hopefully lead to an entire stadium as passionately read and white as three sections of BMO were last night. But its not gonna happen tomorrow - certainly not for a friendly - so let's just give up on the whole program and end the momentum that's only STARTING to grow around Canada.

Guys, listen to the people who were there: we're just as disappointed that it looked like 75% of the stadium was cheering for the other team but it's what was going on with the other 25% that was the real story and where the real difference from the bad old days was.

PROCESS!

Mike is bang on with this, unless you were actually in the Supporter's Section, you have no idea how good this was! It really didn't look or sound as good on tv but that's a Sportsnet production issue not the fault of the South End! I've gone to games in Toronto for many years and this is getting better and better, am I concerned that there weren't more casual Canadian Supporters there, of course! There are so many factors and they have all been mentioned in this thread but as Mike mentioned, this thing is growing, it's getting better and better and I think we should be very proud of the hardcore support that was there! To say that this was an epic failure is an insult to Jamie and the people who worked so hard to make this work! There's a long ways to go to convince the casuals to show up in numbers especially for friendlies, we're on the right track though!

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Hey all.. first time poster here.

I've followed Canada but Wednesday was the first CMNT game I've been to. What a fantastic night! And I'll be at the next come hell or high water! The reason I made it out to the game was due mainly to the grass roots promotion of the game done by local CMNT supports on the TFC board I visit.

I understand the frustration from CMNT fans across Canada when they see Canada fans out numbered when a game is held in Toronto. I agree with all of you - it sucks right now. But as someone who always been involved in local soccer, the CMNT has never really been promoted in and around the GTA until recently. I'm not going to use that an an excuse, but it is a fact that needs to be addressed. With that said, it's the grass roots promotion done by CMNT supporters that I believe got many out the the game on Wednesday night. That should tell us something.

For those calling for no more games in Toronto, again I say I understand your frustration. But for the game to grow, and support for the CMNT to grow, we cannot ignore large markets. We, those of us in the GTA, need to take on the challenge to start promoting the CMNT games ourselves. Let's stop asking why the media or whoever is not. We in the GTA need to stop looking for excuses or reasons for the lack of the support and need to take it upon ourselves to change that. The Support Local Soccer campaign, local CMNT supporters promoting the team on local supporter sites, etc. This is great work done by these people and the kinds of tangible actions that will get people out to the games. These local initiatives will do more to get people out than any ad run by the CSA or spot on Sportsnet.

I'm just one example of how local CMNT supporters turned someone onto the game. Now I'm out there telling all my friends about how awesome it was and how they need to be there. My goal is to bring 5 people with me to the next CMNT game who have never been to one before.

Let's not give up on T.O. yet. There are many here doing what they can to grow the support.

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This is a process, but it is not a process in Toronto alone. This isn't the Toronto Men's National Soccer team. Any Canadian team that's trying to build its popularity but plays only in one time zone isn't worthy of the term.

I don't think anyone reasonable disagrees with this.

That said, there's two things strategically that should be kept in mind:

First, my belief is that you should grow out from the base. The base right now, a base that didn't exist as recently as a decade ago, is the dedicated support for MLS (and the NASL/USL) in Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver. Historically Edmonton has done very well in terms of raw numbers if not necessarily passion (notwithstanding the original V's of course) for national team games (in multiple age groups and both genders). That needs to be solidified first before pushing outwards. Unfortunately neither Vancouver nor Edmonton has an appropriately sized natural grass stadium anymore unless we're talking about going back to Swangard. That shouldn't eliminate them from consideration but it has to be a consideration. People overestimate the difficulty of getting opponents to play on Fieldturf - national associations ARE willing to sacrifice their players for a payday all the time even if they're against artificial surfaces - but it'll generally cost you more money, a "turf premium" if you will, and every extra dollar you spend will cut into the money the CSA could potentially make off of the game. I'm not totally against Fieldturf myself anyways as I think it's the future of the game recreationally and developmentally in a lot of the country so I wouldn't be averse to using those cities for WCQs where we set the conditions and our opponent is in no position to object.

However, the idea of jumping right to the Moncton, St. John's, Regina, etc. tier of cities NOW is unrealistic. Yes, well marketed games their may work as novelty one offs but I really don't believe you'll start to see a dedicated base developing out of such an event. There's just not enough pre-existing dedicated soccer fans in those cities and no local product to keep them engaged between games. We all know how long the stretches are between meaningful matches for Canada; often ANY matches for Canada. On the one hand that's just part and parcel of the international game but it's made worse by the limited relevance of our team on the international scene (even domestically). Go to Regina once and you might get 15-20K fans turning up in red and white ready to enjoy a nice evening out with their friends and countrymen just like most of the Ecuadorians at BMO Wednesday night. Come Thursday though it's very unlikely most of those people will be any more inclined to seek out news of or watch obscure games of Canada when the team leaves their city. Just like other fringe sports it'll be something they pay attention to when it's relevant to them locally or (imaginably) when Canada actually manages to become competitive at a major international event. Most Canadians aren't massive fans of swimming and don't religiously follow our national team in that sport either but if you held a World Championships in their city they'd show up for the novelty before going back to ignoring the sport until each Olympic cycle rolls around.

Second, it can't be repeated enough but media, media, MEDIA! I know the ROC hates it but the reality is that Toronto is the media capital of this country. Making the games easily accessable and relevant there is the fastest way to raise the visibility of our national program outside of World Cup qualification. Vancouver, Montreal, and Edmonton/Calgary would be next on the list. Further, the profile of TFC - for all their mediocrity and outright failures - has lead to an EXPLOSION in the amount and quality of coverage of domestic soccer here. Something like the SupportLocalFootball video would have been possible six years ago but recognizable media faces relevant to the local market as part of it would not have been. Those people are very much onside with the national team program and using their positions to do the outreach to Canadian soccer fans - but not necessarily Canada fans - that we've always been so desperate for. I'm not in Vancouver but I imagine that the process is well along the way in that market as well (and they were probably starting from a stronger base in this regard). Montreal, as the media capital of our nation's other major language, will be important too (and will also soon have an MLS team to create more dedicated local domestic oriented soccer media). Moving games away from the markets where those voices are relevant is premature. Beyond that the truly national, mainstream Canadian media needs to see the program relevant and successful in the major cities where they are and their sponsors are headquartered to convince them that this is something they can take advantage of for their own benefit. Too much of the media coverage of Canada is borderline charity or pity coverage from the little bits of those institutions that care and would like to see the game grow. Make the team relevant in Toronto, Vancouver, and Montreal in the way that their MLS/NASL teams are and watch what starts to happen from the mainstream. The fact is that's better for Moncton, St. John's, and Regina too because raising the profile of the team will let the dedicated fans of the team there enjoy more media coverage of away games and make it more of an event when the team does eventually arrive to play in their city.

Again, base first then outward. That's my strategic plan that hopefully will see us get to where the U.S. arrived over the last decade for their home matches.

And there's still lots and lots and lots of work to do to solidify and grow the base but the process has (finally) started in earnest. Let's be clear: there are people seriously suggesting that the CSA run away from Toronto (again) after Wednesday night. They turned on their TV's, saw a lot of yellow, and heard Gerry and Craig moaning but they're not listening to the people who were at the game. Longtime V's who said this was the BEST national team night at BMO yet. New fans who were in the frothing, borderline mosh pit after the goals, sea of red and white in 112-114 and are now more committed than ever to Canada. There are people suggesting that they "feel sorry" for the players who are ignoring the spontaneous reaction of Terry Dunfield to his goal. They didn't see Borjan turn to the supporters behind him to fire us up and help lift the team before the decisive free kick only to go completely bonkers with us after the ball went in. Those players understood what was going on: BMO may still have looked more like an away game for the team but, just like an away game with real away support, the support of 2000 or so dedicated passionate fans lifted them more than 15,000 sorta interested spectators. Last night forged a real connection between our players and the core support in Toronto and it's my hope that we'll see more and more of that in the future to set the stage for the next phase of growth.

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Guys, there's a thread for this attendance crap:

http://www.cansoc.org/showthread.php?42249-Canadian-attendance-at-home-CMNT-matches

Let's get this thread back on track, talking about the game.

Then the mods should move all of it. Replying in different threads doesn't really work and the complaints need to be answered before a stupid narrative of "failure" becomes a reality through repitition. It's already started happening with the Jamaica WCQ that revisionism has retroactively turned into a disappointment rather than amongst the best pro-Canada turnouts in modern national team history.

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I think people are missing a few things that you can't see on TV.

There is a growing will here. Take ANB Academy. They shut down all operations and brought out EVERY player they have. Something we can move forward with. No amount of advertising and marketing can make this happen. It's the relationships we need to build over time that matter, not the number of ads in any paper.

The relationships we need to build are happening here now, but a few more things need to be put in place before it will really take off.

We will be doing a post mortem on this game with all interested parties and that has never happened before. This of course will be the norm no matter where the game is played, but is a real positive step forward. There are ways we can improve things, but we need the chance to do it. Then copy it and replicate it.

If this game is at 8 instead of 7, our numbers in the south end would have been increased by 50%. It would have a huge impact on casual fan numbers. It's just next to impossible to get to BMO by 7 if you get off work at 5 or 6 and live/work in the burbs. Yes Ecuadorian fans made it out. But they were not all from Toronto. Travel agents brought in groups from New York, Chicago, Boston, Detroit... ect...

EDIT: **** Re Posting in proper thread. Please respond there. ****

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It doesn't take a Norman Einstein to figure out there is a problem, when in a market of 5 million, only 5000 fans show up, to see you play at home to 5000 empty seats and several more thousand cheering for the opposite side.

Of course it's a problem. It always has been. But the process to change that has finally STARTED. We're only now, in the last four years, even attempting to fix it. Giving up now, not focusing in few markets where the greatest potential is, and ignoring what is starting to happen is ridiculous. Your suggestion is equivalent to opening a new store in a location you've ignored for years because there's tough competition and deciding to close it after a few months because you're not making money yet even though you've created a small, passionate and dedicated clientle who can (and are only starting to) act as evangilists for your brand. Mighty oaks grow from small acorns or whatever the phrase is! Just don't switch to growing dandelions after a week because they sprout faster.

Those Ecuador guys won't be part of what you are trying to build.

95% of them? Yes, absolutely. Most Ecaudorians there are probably barely soccer fans. But the small "convertable" subgroup (who I believe are actually predominantly first generation immigrants who chose to come here themselves as adults or young adults)? I think we need to be doing more outreach with a solid sales pitch for Canada to them. I love "show us your passport" as much as the next guy but some of those fans will look at what's going on beside them and recognize that supporting Canada is becoming FUN and want to be part of it. We need to sell them on the diversity of our support and how they can add their voice to that. Most new Canadians want to protect their cultural heritage but simultaneously join the cultural mosaic that is Canada: they're the ones we can win over. Good, intelligent, savvy football performances by the team won't hurt.

Just ignore the "Canada sucks; my homeland (that I've only ever heard stories of and never actually lived in) will kick their ass" crowd of unconvertables of course. The Americans still deal with that even though they've got a more hegemonic national identity and their team has been beating a lot of the "homelands" for a while now.

Exactly where's the growth?

In the organized passionate support. That part IS WORKING. This was a fricken friendly, a week before many of us plan to road trip, during a spring suffering from complete over saturation in the local Toronto soccer calendar (thanks to a crappy MLS schedule) and it was still bigger and better than ever before at ANY CANADA GAME EVER. Period. Full stop.

Wait 'til WCQ when the games matter and see what happens next.

Process.

And again before you get defensive, nobody has been criticizing the people there, just the whiny excuse makers of why they can't get near to a decent Canadian supporter turnout ie 20,000.

I get that you're not criticizing me or the others that were there. That's not what gets our backs up.

It's the fact that a bunch of people sitting in remote locations (and Gerry and Craig) don't understand the nuances of what is changing on the ground here. Honestly, you guys come across like parents who are disappointed that your newborn can't ride a bike yet.

The seed has germinated and started to grow. Don't go misallocate resources elsewhere right now though out of a vain short term desire to feel good about the general colour of the stadium today before it's had time to really take root and we get to see what will happen as we move forward.

Ironically, one of my degrees is in marketing but for God's sakes this is common sense.

I'm tempted to go for snark there but I'll let it pass! I should apologize. I snapped back at your original post after reading a series of increasingly inflammatory suggestions that Toronto needs to be avoided in the future.

You're a long timer around here and you're entitled to whatever opinion you want but take it from the people on the ground how it feels here: Toronto is changing and aborting that process now would lead to us wasting another decade or more.

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"This was a fricken friendly, a week before many of us plan to road trip, during a spring suffering from complete over saturation in the local Toronto soccer calendar (thanks to a crappy MLS schedule) and it was still bigger and better than ever before at ANY CANADA GAME EVER. Period. Full stop."

Wrong. The best recent home friendly in terms of support was the MTL - HON game last year. 7500 showed up, but 5000-5500 were cheering for Canada. That being said, I am not one of those who would simply cross out any city. But I have nothing against trying other.

CSA should also take the community population in consideration when choosing a venue for CMNT game. They should try to avoid cities where chances there will be large opposing support.

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"This was a fricken friendly, a week before many of us plan to road trip, during a spring suffering from complete over saturation in the local Toronto soccer calendar (thanks to a crappy MLS schedule) and it was still bigger and better than ever before at ANY CANADA GAME EVER. Period. Full stop."

Wrong. The best recent home friendly in terms of support was the MTL - HON game last year. 7500 showed up, but 5000-5500 were cheering for Canada. That being said, I am not one of those who would simply cross out any city. But I have nothing against trying other.

CSA should also take the community population in consideration when choosing a venue for CMNT game. They should try to avoid cities where chances there will be large opposing support.

NO NO NO!!! Absolutely not.

We can't grow the game and support by hiding the team from away supporters. It doesn't work, and does nothing for us in the long run.

We need to take growing it head on. It's not about 'trying' another city. It's about building relevancy within the local soccer community and you do that by building relationships and making a case for supporting the game they are part of. This is the place to do it, or at least let us try.

lets move this to the proper thread.

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See this is where you go wrong with your post. There was a lot of vocal support from Canadian fans (who btw did a great job owning Ecuador fans). Also, you're acting like Toronto is only city in Canada has a problem with supporting CMNT. Other cities had so many chances to support CMNT in the past, but suddenly Toronto is getting bulk of games and we got people here crying murder over it. I like I said before, name me one city that had better support than Toronto in the past?

FYI, Toronto just set a record for CMNT friendly attendance which is good thing because CSA is making money now so they can invest in CMNT more. Also in WCQ, Toronto has proven to support CMNT by outnumbering Jamaican supporters unlike Montreal (Honduras) and Edmonton (Mexico).

Go back to school fool.

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Disputed.

What about T&T and Mexico games in Edmonton? Remember those days? Too bad you guys failed to continue supporting Canada after that Brazil game.

EDIT: I am sorry, I meant recent history when I mention that.

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Shame on the Canadian press for calling the tying goal "controversial" in their article (which seemed to be the only one I've seen picked up my a lot of the print newspapers that have bothered to run a story on it). I suppose that any goal that one team decides to whine about could be considered "controversial", which would be about 50% of all goals scored in soccer - whether it was actually controversial to a neutral observer (which the press are supposed to be) is another matter. Ecuador took advantage of quick free kicks the whole game - they can hardly complain that Canada decided to do so, and whining about whether it was a foul to begin with was pointless - especially that many players doing it

You are absolutely correct. I thought that goal was poetic justice - divers, fakers, cheats and time-wasters should always get exactly what they deserve, and for once they did, when their predictable feigned-outrage display of bullying the referee was punished with a goal. It was absolutely perfect. This Ecuadorian team should be embarrassed for the time wasting they did (though, sadly, those without honour do not show any shame) in the last minutes of what is supposed to be a sporting tune-up, not an acting lesson. The guy who clattered into our player, and then pretended he was the injured party, was the guy that caused me to chuck Ecuador in with all the other countries whose athletes collectively don't seem to possess much honesty or integrity.

What is needed is for FIFA to review all dives in all international matches on video, and hand out 5 and 10 game bans on players who are shown (beyond a doubt) on video to have dived with zero contact. I do not understand why such an office hasn't been established. Why are integrity, honesty, etc held in so little regard, when we now possess the technology to enforce them? Imagine the boost in morale this would provide officials, to know that the game's authorities were giving them that kind of support in doing their job?

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Good points, Mike.

The main reason for using Toronto is the facility. When the Caps are in BC Place, we'll probably see Vancouver get Canada games again. Obviously it's a good thing that this game WASN'T held in Vancouver during the Canuck's playoff run - though that said, we still got 15,000 out to the Cdn Champ game on a Canuck's game night.

As long as Toronto has the biggest natural grass SSS in Canada, it's the best facility. Edmonton is now artificial, and also too large and cavernous. Beyond that, there's Montreal, and that's it. We shouldn't be playing soccer on artificial turf in grid-iron stadia. The lines look horrible and amateur on television.

I have always felt that we won't EVER have a large, organised, passionate VOYAGEURS section and group unless we built that off of existing pro teams. The end zone at Toronto Wedenesday night, I think, proved this. It was the most organised and passionate Canada crowd I've ever seen, and that's because of all the experience that end zone and people in it have had at Toronto FC games. The same will happen in Vancouver and Montreal. The problem is that they need to be taking up the east stand, not the south end zone, in order to really impress television viewers, and create the "dominance" over the visitors that we need to have. But the fact that we have an organised section is vital. In games in Victoria, we get a mostly Canadian crowd, but the handful of Mexicans (or whatever) always bring a drum, and always outsing the locals, even if they can't "outclap" them.

Like everyone I was disappointed that the rest of the stadium was mostly empty. The yellow shirts would have been tolerable if all the empty ones had red shirts in them. But they didn't. And in an area with 5 million people, this makes this an issue, and makes ideas like temporary facilities in Moncton reasonable alternatives, because you know that they will sell 20,000 tickets there, and get a pro-Canada crowd.

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Good points, Mike.

The main reason for using Toronto is the facility. When the Caps are in BC Place, we'll probably see Vancouver get Canada games again. Obviously it's a good thing that this game WASN'T held in Vancouver during the Canuck's playoff run - though that said, we still got 15,000 out to the Cdn Champ game on a Canuck's game night.

As long as Toronto has the biggest natural grass SSS in Canada, it's the best facility. Edmonton is now artificial, and also too large and cavernous. Beyond that, there's Montreal, and that's it. We shouldn't be playing soccer on artificial turf in grid-iron stadia. The lines look horrible and amateur on television.

I have always felt that we won't EVER have a large, organised, passionate VOYAGEURS section and group unless we built that off of existing pro teams. The end zone at Toronto Wedenesday night, I think, proved this. It was the most organised and passionate Canada crowd I've ever seen, and that's because of all the experience that end zone and people in it have had at Toronto FC games. The same will happen in Vancouver and Montreal. The problem is that they need to be taking up the east stand, not the south end zone, in order to really impress television viewers, and create the "dominance" over the visitors that we need to have. But the fact that we have an organised section is vital. In games in Victoria, we get a mostly Canadian crowd, but the handful of Mexicans (or whatever) always bring a drum, and always outsing the locals, even if they can't "outclap" them.

Like everyone I was disappointed that the rest of the stadium was mostly empty. The yellow shirts would have been tolerable if all the empty ones had red shirts in them. But they didn't. And in an area with 5 million people, this makes this an issue, and makes ideas like temporary facilities in Moncton reasonable alternatives, because you know that they will sell 20,000 tickets there, and get a pro-Canada crowd.

I think the game vs. Jamaica was awesome because we had the east stand presence as well with the voyageurs separated from the South End

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