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Considering they apparently turn back a lot of applications due to failing to hit certain standards, I wonder if a L2O could have a bit relaxed standards with the possibility of promotion if the teams once the teams do hit guidelines? Could be a way to get more organizations under the umbrella and working within the system while still ensuring only good organizations get into L1O?

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19 minutes ago, Complete Homer said:

Considering they apparently turn back a lot of applications due to failing to hit certain standards, I wonder if a L2O could have a bit relaxed standards with the possibility of promotion if the teams once the teams do hit guidelines? Could be a way to get more organizations under the umbrella and working within the system while still ensuring only good organizations get into L1O?

I'm concerned that could just be a way for teams to cheap out and not try to hit standards.

Besides, if this does involve pro/rel, you'll want them to meet the L1O off-field standards if they do get promoted.

Honestly though, I'm happy if L1O keeps upping the standards as opposed to upping the teams.  I'd rather have better teams than more teams at this point.

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https://archive.org/details/DinoL1StateOfUnion2016End

Interview with Dino about future plans.  Quick notes:

- Content with TFC putting a younger squad in (perhaps indicating they won't be forced out of PDL?)
- Aiming to slow growth compared to the last few seasons, and expand into the "outlying" areas (eastern Ontario, Niagara region, western 401, the North).  Want to ensure that every game is meaningful and competition level is high.
- Will look at competition structures as league grows (not willing to go into detail) - "tiering is something you have to look at" but not ready to make any commitments.
- Hopes to see fully-professional women's sides in Canada within the next 5-10 years, whether this is part of NWSL or some other setup (this seemed to be a personal desire as opposed to any insider info).
- CPL would be important piece to make L1O more relevant in a high-performance pathway; would fit in like major junior hockey does for talent discovery.  Not all CPL clubs would necessarily have an academy team "initially" as project starts up.

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Learned on the Livestream, FC London's head coach has his UEFA Pro License: http://www.lfpress.com/2016/01/27/everything-new-at-fc-london

Despotovic was the youngest individual to be granted a UEFA PRO coaching licence. He began coaching when he was 20 and it took him 10 years to qualify for that level of coaching licence.

Martin Painter had been the coach of the FC London senior side since the birth of the organization. League 1 requires their coaches to have at the least a provincial B-licence before they can be eligible to coach in the league.

Despotovic came to London last year as a visiting coach for a summer camp. He said he was approached then about coming to Canada to coach.

“When I came over for one week and I saw all this different cultures here and I saw this talent, I see that the players just need some guidance and coaching,” he said. “It’s not to tell them what to do but to set up the problems so that the players can make their own decision.”

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On 10/14/2016 at 1:50 PM, Gopherbashi said:

https://archive.org/details/DinoL1StateOfUnion2016End

Interview with Dino about future plans.  Quick notes:

- Content with TFC putting a younger squad in (perhaps indicating they won't be forced out of PDL?)
- Aiming to slow growth compared to the last few seasons, and expand into the "outlying" areas (eastern Ontario, Niagara region, western 401, the North).  Want to ensure that every game is meaningful and competition level is high.
- Will look at competition structures as league grows (not willing to go into detail) - "tiering is something you have to look at" but not ready to make any commitments.
- Hopes to see fully-professional women's sides in Canada within the next 5-10 years, whether this is part of NWSL or some other setup (this seemed to be a personal desire as opposed to any insider info).
- CPL would be important piece to make L1O more relevant in a high-performance pathway; would fit in like major junior hockey does for talent discovery.  Not all CPL clubs would necessarily have an academy team "initially" as project starts up.

BC & Alberta need to get their own League1 Western Canada setup launched to complete the Canadian D3 level.

CPL clubs can then have their reserve/academy clubs in those L1 and PLSQ league's.

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Think it's because L1O claim on paper to be D3 semi-pro even although they are basically an amateur league in practice. The National Championship is only for amateur teams. It would be interesting to see who would win if L1O teams played against top OSL teams and the likes of London Marconi from the top district leagues in the larger cities outside the GTA.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Not sure if this is the best spot for this, but I was curious, has anyone seen what the L1O applications look like? I was curious to see how net worth requirements, etc, compare to PDL and NPSL, but I'm not really willing to pose as a football organization to get a look at the document.

 

https://league1ontario.sportngin.com/register/form/932561730?_ga=1.147497471.912755181.1473862932

 

Also, I know a lot of PDL/NPSL teams operate as trusts, are there any current L1O or PLSQ teams that do so?

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5 hours ago, Complete Homer said:

Also, I know a lot of PDL/NPSL teams operate as trusts, are there any current L1O or PLSQ teams that do so?

I don't believe there are any fan trusts currently, most of the teams are preexisting clubs and academies with private, non-fan ownership that just made the move up from the provincial leagues. The exceptions are FC Lanaudiere and (until next season) FC Gatineau, which are founded and owned by their regional soccer associations.

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7 hours ago, Complete Homer said:

Not sure if this is the best spot for this, but I was curious, has anyone seen what the L1O applications look like? I was curious to see how net worth requirements, etc, compare to PDL and NPSL, but I'm not really willing to pose as a football organization to get a look at the document.

 

https://league1ontario.sportngin.com/register/form/932561730?_ga=1.147497471.912755181.1473862932

 

Also, I know a lot of PDL/NPSL teams operate as trusts, are there any current L1O or PLSQ teams that do so?

The best info I have for you about L1O standards is this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/League1_Ontario#Regulations

Admittedly it doesn't give you much.  I'm also under the impression that L1O sides are supposed to have a minimum $100k annual budget (presumably going towards staff, coaching, and travel rather than player salaries), but I can't give you a source on that.

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7 hours ago, Complete Homer said:

Not sure if this is the best spot for this, but I was curious, has anyone seen what the L1O applications look like? I was curious to see how net worth requirements, etc, compare to PDL and NPSL, but I'm not really willing to pose as a football organization to get a look at the document.

Found the pro-am league regulations on the OSA's website:

http://www.ontariosoccer.net/images/publications/2016/Governance/Forms_and_Documents/Reference_Document_-_OSA_Standards_for_Pro-Am.pdf

This was apparently updated this year. In terms of budget, @Gopherbashi is right, section 13.1 requires that "Each team should operate on an annual team budget of at least, $100,000." There's no owner net worth requirement of any kind that I saw. I couldn't find any club application forms or anything like that on the OSA's Governing Docs page either (http://www.ontariosoccer.net/governing-documents).

Interestingly, they do apparently have a requirement for salaried players under section 14:

"""""

14.0 TEAM PLAYER BUDGET

14.1

Each team in 2016 should operate on at least a $24,000 budget for player salaries with at least five (5) of the players on each team having a professional contract and being paid at least $2,000 per year. In 2016, the salary cap for each team shall be $40,000. The OSA and the League will continually monitor the number of players on contracts equal to or over $2,000 per year to ensure compliance. Should a team fall below the minimum, they will be subject to disciplinary sanctions imposed by the OSA which may include, but is not limited to, fines, point deduction, or suspension from the league.

14.2

The OSA and the League have the right to audit the overall number of $24,000 salary budget at the end of the year. If a team is not in compliance, the team and the league may be subject to disciplinary sanctions imposed by the Provincial Association.

"""""

Also, section 16 states that there's a plan to have an academy requirement for all clubs in place by 2018. Clubs will be required to field at least one youth side in the highest youth league in their region, although they can to use an affilite youth club instead if they so choose.

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On 2016/09/03 at 4:45 PM, shermanator said:

Looks like FC London are launching an academy. Details are spare, but here it says it starts at U4 through their L1O squad. Good stuff.

http://londonontariosports.com/major/fc-london/fc-london-launches-youth-academy/

Latest is that a player from London has been selected to be part of the TFC 2005 Academy team:

http://londonontariosports.com/major/fc-london/toronto-fc-eyes-young-london-star-dante-doria/

FC London Academy 2005 player Dante D’Oria has been selected to be part of the “TFC 2005 Academy” team after several trials at TFC’s KIA Training Centre in Toronto. With the player’s young age (11) TFC Academy will allow Dante to attend only 1-2 sessions per week, while the bulk of his player and skills development will remain in London under the guidance of the FC London Academy training program.

The D'Orias have been a very well respected family in London, Ont soccer for many decades.

 

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  • 1 month later...

League1 Ontario has announced expansion for 2017. One new club on the men's side (Ottawa South United ) and three new clubs on the women's side (West Ottawa Soccer Club, Toronto Azzurri Blizzard and Unionville Milliken SC).

From the article: "For this round of expansion, the League1 Ontario Steering Committee opted to restrict new entries to apply to enter a team in either the Men's or Women's Division to ease their transition to operating at this level."

http://www.league1ontario.com/news_article/show/735737?referrer_id=2309049

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9 minutes ago, Kent said:

2016 was the last year for KW United to get sanctioning in PDL right? Hopefully they will still be able to move over to L1O. I haven't missed any news on that front have I?

No news on that front.  I tweeted a few people a couple weeks ago but heard only silence back.  I know from KW and TB's twitter accounts that they attended the PDL's AGM this month, so they appear to still be fully committed to that league (or it could be a show of resistance if they are still being forced over on January 1st).

TFC renaming their "senior academy" L1O team to TFC3 makes this even more mysterious, as they've typically been treating their PDL team as the more important of the two.

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1 hour ago, Gopherbashi said:

TFC renaming their "senior academy" L1O team to TFC3 makes this even more mysterious, as they've typically been treating their PDL team as the more important of the two.

IIRC in the first year of L1O, TFC placed their senior team there until it became apparent they were too good. Now, it is more fluid, and they move players between the too, but keep younger ones in L1O.

Hopefully, the TFC3-nomer shows that the paying players will actually come into effect soon for L1O. Hence the PDL will be strictly for NCAA complaint players whilst TFC3 will be paid players. 

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5 minutes ago, Pqhbv said:

IIRC in the first year of L1O, TFC placed their senior team there until it became apparent they were too good. Now, it is more fluid, and they move players between the too, but keep younger ones in L1O.

Hopefully, the TFC3-nomer shows that the paying players will actually come into effect soon for L1O. Hence the PDL will be strictly for NCAA complaint players whilst TFC3 will be paid players. 

I actually chatted to Rossi about that, and it corrected my understanding of the rule. In the pro-am setup, each team selects if they will be "pro" or "amateur" in a given season. If you go pro, you must pay a minimum of 5 players a minimum of $2000, with a salary cap of $40000

However, if you go pro, you lose access to all of your returning NCAA players. In my opinion, at this point, these guys represent major assets that making going pro to attract a handful of top end semi-pro guys a bad tradeoff. Maybe that changes in the future if quality continues to improve, but not now.  I don't think it is simply a financial issue stopping these small payments from being dolled out, it's that going pro makes you less competitive while simultaneously being a bit more expensive (though not hugely so if you look at minimum L1O expenditures). 

As TFC has a separate PDL team that the NCAA guys are sequestered to, they are probably the only side that could improve themselves at this point by going pro, but as they are a pure development side, there's no reason to go out and grab semi-pro vets 

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