CSL 1991 - Nova Scotia vs Vancouver 86ers (full game)

[Toje]

 

A rare find on youtube

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

That's a pretty good indication of what a run of the mill CSL game looked like in quality terms. Some of the other CSL games that have appeared on youtube were unusually good ones. That's an unusually large crowd and makes sense as it was the season home opener.

[An Observer]

I used to go to the CSL matches back in the day...mostly Hamilton and some Blizzard and Rockets as well.  The CPL will have to make it much more professional looking than that for it to fly and attract the 8,000 to 10,000 they need long term to survive.

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

There are some very good players playing in that game (mainly for the visitors from Vancouver but the Clippers also had a reasonable nucleus of talent even if Gordon Hill of Manchester United and England fame was very much in washed up has been mode by that point), so the problem is more with the venue. The game above looks terrible mainly because the pitch is too narrow and has a very uneven playing surface, so the midfield is too congested and there are way too many wayward passes happening for a team like the 86ers that liked to keep it on the deck and pass it around to make their significantly higher skill level work for them.

That's what often tended to happen when soccer was played on a long and narrow natural grass university type Canadian football field that tends to have a slight crown unlike soccer pitches. If anything games on marked astroturf in large CFL stadia in Hamilton and Winnipeg were even worse to watch in that era because of the unnatural bounce. Field turf helps, especially when it is unmarked, but it's still not ideal. There's a reason why the soccer specific stadium was the key to progress with MLS because in addition to the enhanced control over revenue streams it finally made the games look like ones broadcast from Europe in terms of their presentation and playing styles. Shoehorning soccer teams into Canadian football stadia isn't the answer. There really need to be new venues that are custom built for soccer and we are only hearing about that happening in Halifax right now.

[An Observer]

In the 80s and early 90s, Hamilton Steelers never played at Ivor Wynne, they always played at Brian Timmins beside it (like Clark to Commonwealth stadium; or Saputo to Olympic) which was grass other than perhaps for friendlies against touring European sides.  I vaguely remember a Rangers game a Ivor Wynne. But even with European sides, I generally remember them being played at Brian Timmins like Den Haag.  The only match I remember at Ivor Wynne in the 80s was Canada U20s versus Chile U20s where we tied them 1-1 with players like Nick DeSantis, Alex Bunbury, etc. Back then, we were honestly not that far off Chile in quality.  How times change.  The lack of a national league (or equal treatment as we had in the original NASL) has really set us so far backward in football its crazy.

[gator]

17 minutes ago, An Observer said:

In the 80s and early 90s, Hamilton Steelers never played at Ivor Wynne, they always played at Brian Timmins beside it (like Clark to Commonwealth stadium; or Saputo to Olympic) which was grass other than perhaps for friendlies against touring European sides.  I vaguely remember a Rangers game a Ivor Wynne. But even with European sides, I generally remember them being played at Brian Timmins like Den Haag.  The only match I remember at Ivor Wynne in the 80s was Canada U20s versus Chile U20s where we tied them 1-1 with players like Nick DeSantis, Alex Bunbury, etc. Back then, we were honestly not that far off Chile in quality.  How times change.  The lack of a national league (or equal treatment as we had in the original NASL) has really set us so far backward in football its crazy.

I was at that Den Haag match as well, the Rangers match was vs The Blizzard IIRC in the early 80's! The U20 match you refer to was a preliminary before the Pan Am Qualifying match vs Bermuda in 1987, I just found the program the other day! In the early 90's the Hamilton Cup featured Aberdeen, Celtic, Hearts and a team from Ottawa, a friend of mine lost about $100K promoting that tournament!

[grasshopper1917]

17 hours ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

That's what often tended to happen when soccer was played on a long and narrow natural grass university type Canadian football field that tends to have a slight crown unlike soccer pitches. If anything games on marked astroturf in large CFL stadia in Hamilton and Winnipeg were even worse to watch in that era because of the unnatural bounce. Field turf helps, especially when it is unmarked, but it's still not ideal. There's a reason why the soccer specific stadium was the key to progress with MLS because in addition to the enhanced control over revenue streams it finally made the games look like ones broadcast from Europe in terms of their presentation and playing styles. Shoehorning soccer teams into Canadian football stadia isn't the answer. There really need to be new venues that are custom built for soccer and we are only hearing about that happening in Halifax right now.

Something we agree on. A large part of the fan experience for a soccer match is atmosphere. It is hard for 6000 or 7000 soccer fans to create much atmosphere playing in a 30,000 seat CFL football stadium. 

One of the guys from the Halifax management group actually made a good point. He said he would rather start with 5000 seats and have it filled which would create a buzz and make the ticket a hot item. Then the option is always there to add some seats for the next season if the demand warrants it. 

The alternative is to build too many seats say 10,000 and have it half empty creating a lack of atmosphere. He pointed out the first option they felt would be much more appealing.

BTW I think there is a good chance today MLS would be extinct if they still played all their games in cavernous NFL stadiums. The atmosphere was terrible and it made for horrible tv when over 50% of the seats were empty.

[Toje]

3 hours ago, gator said:

I was at that Den Haag match as well, the Rangers match was vs The Blizzard IIRC in the early 80's! The U20 match you refer to was a preliminary before the Pan Am Qualifying match vs Bermuda in 1987, I just found the program the other day! In the early 90's the Hamilton Cup featured Aberdeen, Celtic, Hearts and a team from Ottawa, a friend of mine lost about $100K promoting that tournament!

I think the other team in the Hamilton Cup was the Montreal Impact. 

 

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

5 hours ago, An Observer said:

In the 80s and early 90s, Hamilton Steelers never played at Ivor Wynne, ...

They started off playing at least some CSL games at Ivor Wynne (I can vaguely remember an Alex Bunbury goal that was broadcast on TSN and another game with visiting Blizzard supporters in close proximity to the press box singing a song with the f-word featuring prominently) and then moved to Brian Timmins, is the way I remember it. In a similar way the Blizzard started off at Varsity stadium where they had played at least some of their NASL games three years earlier, but moved to Centennial Stadium in Etobicoke when crowd levels didn't justify the extra expenses involved (the Lynx did much the same in the late 90s). The initial hopes for the CSL in terms of spectator interest didn't materialize anywhere except Vancouver and the only surprise about the whole thing looking back was that they were somehow able to stagger on for another five seasons.

4 hours ago, grasshopper1917 said:

BTW I think there is a good chance today MLS would be extinct if they still played all their games in cavernous NFL stadiums. The atmosphere was terrible and it made for horrible tv when over 50% of the seats were empty.

Think there is absolutely no doubt about that.

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

2 hours ago, Toje said:

I think the other team in the Hamilton Cup was the Montreal Impact.

The way I remember it is that it was an NSL select team as at the time the CSA only sanctioned games or tournaments involving touring sides if a local team was involved. RICK TITUS (the caps are an inside joke for oldtimers on here) got a trial with Aberdeen out of it from what I remember, but ran into work permit issues. An NSL select also played AC Milan complete with the likes of Baresi and Donadoni in London, Ont at JW Little stadium at around the same time, which was a bit surreal to watch if you had played there yourself.

[An Observer]

don't remember the Steelers playing at Ivor Wynne but its a long time ago so perhaps they played the odd match. Even in the first year, I remember them playing at Brian Timmis as they renovated the stadium for them and put a set of bleachers on the far side. 

I remember the Bermuda match as well....you are right that the matches happened the same day. Don't remember that.

From google..

THIS DAY IN FOOTBALL: 25 April 1987
Canada qualifies for the X Pan American Games with a 1:0 victory over Bermuda at Ivor Wynne Stadium in Hamilton. Canada wins the away-and-home series 2-0 on total goals, with the first victory secured seven days earlier in Hamilton, Bermuda. Lucio Ianiero scores the winning goal less than a minute after the opening whistle (15 seconds after a pass from John Catliff). On the same day in Hamilton, the Canada Qualifying match is preceded by a Canada U-19 match that ends in a 1:1 draw with Chile.

[Toje]

5 hours ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

The way I remember it is that it was an NSL select team as at the time the CSA only sanctioned games or tournaments involving touring sides if a local team was involved. RICK TITUS (the caps are an inside joke for oldtimers on here) got a trial with Aberdeen out of it from what I remember, but ran into work permit issues. An NSL select also played AC Milan complete with the likes of Baresi and Donadoni in London, Ont at JW Little stadium at around the same time, which was a bit surreal to watch if you had played there yourself.

I am almost 100% certain that Colin Jose has the Montreal Impact playing in the tournament and not a select team.  I have his Ontario soccer history book, and I can look it up later.  

http://www.thecelticwiki.com/page/The+Hamilton+Cup

https://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hamilton_Cup

Here is a programme from the tournament

http://www.collectsoccer.com/in-canada-celtic-v-heart-of-midlothian-22-05-1994-and-impact-de-montreal-v-aberdeen-25-05-1994-official-programme-the-scottish-festival-1994.html

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

It mentions on wikipedia that RICK TITUS played in trial games for Aberdeen against Hearts and Celtic, so that probably explains why I remembered things that way:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Titus_(soccer)

Heard it was all a bit of a fiasco from people that went to watch the games, but forget the gory details.

[Alex D]

There used to be a lot more CSL matches on YouTube but I can't seem to find them anymore. Anybody know what happened to them?

[theaub]

Stephen Hart isn't a bad colour guy tbh

[Ivan]

Pretty sure I was at the first Hamilton Steelers game and it was at Ivor Wynne.  Can't remember how many more were there, but not many.

[gator]

On 2017-02-17 at 8:31 AM, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

It mentions on wikipedia that RICK TITUS played in trial games for Aberdeen against Hearts and Celtic, so that probably explains why I remembered things that way:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rick_Titus_(soccer)

Heard it was all a bit of a fiasco from people that went to watch the games, but forget the gory details.

I was talking to my friend Jimmy Noble at the pub last night, he was the co-promoter of the tournament which was in 1994, he lost a lot of money on this! They had an agreement from both Rangers and Celtic to play an Old Firm Derby in Hamilton, it would have sold lots of tickets, the CSA insisted they include a Canadian team in a tournament format hence why the Impact were there! Rangers weren't interested in playing any more that one match and pulled out, Hearts and Aberdeen stepped in to try to save the event, it just never worked! I'm forever indebted to Jimmy for bringing Hearts to The Hammer anyway! 

[Toje]

Krammerhead (an old poster who hasn't posted in years) uploaded a few CSL games on youtube, but they have since been deleted.  I downloaded all of them at the time, but I can't seem to find them.

 

[Alex D]

Yes, that's who it was! That was really bugging me. Its a shame he deleted them, I enjoyed watching them from time to time. 

[BringBackTheBlizzard]

3 hours ago, Toje said:

Krammerhead (an old poster who hasn't posted in years) uploaded a few CSL games on youtube, but they have since been deleted.  I downloaded all of them at the time, but I can't seem to find them.

 

Not even the wayback machine helps us on this:

http://web.archive.org/web/20140313002444/http://www.youtube.com/user/TheKrammerhead