Victoria CPL

[ted]

22 hours ago, BringBackTheBlizzard said:

Which points very strongly to another location having been in mind when they came up with those, but that's not exactly a secret at this point. They could do a lot worse than Victoria United.

Yep, but sadly while that name came up in reminiscing with Josh it never really came up in the discussion. They seem really fixated on the whole concept of a "clean start" (my words).
 

7 hours ago, ktf said:

I think using Vancouver Island branding is the best approach because it is unlikely there will ever be a second island team (Nanaimo would certainly start in a second division, if ever). I grew up in the Cowichan Valley, but have lived most of my adult life in Victoria. However, I know plenty of people who would make the drive to attend games, especially in Langford. Even if this only accounts for 50 to 500 people/G that is not bad. Game time/day will be a big factor.

I disagree on both counts.

1) If this league survives I think Nanaimo would be a shoe-in for an expansion team down the road, especially if they ever create a CanPL2.

2) Sure, diehards may come down from north of the Malahat (1- 1.5 hrs travel time is pretty standard for marketing purposes) but those diehards will come to support pro soccer or watch "big" games like when we play the Whitecaps in the VCup. They will not in any way be dissuaded by the team using "Victoria" in the name.

More importantly, NOT using Victoria in the name will signal this is a franchise that can move anywhere and be "from" nowhere. It goes against the heart of football culture which is urban-based, not regionally organized. It will make people mock the idea of pandering to "customers" rather than building a "local" club.

But to be fair, I'm an old fart and it probably won't matter. In the end the guys with the money will make the choice. 

[masster]

On 6/2/2018 at 10:39 PM, ted said:

The only sad note was the lack of cooperation (up until now) with the Highlanders. They did talk about working with them, but they are starting something new. A fresh start without "baggage" is how I would describe their thinking.
 

This scares me. Victoria is not big enough to withstand divisions in the soccer community. In order to draw the 5-6,000 people they are talking about, you can't have 2 different organizations competing to sell tickets and confusing the general public.

[Jason Armond]

Victoria Divided FC

[ktf]

12 hours ago, ted said:

Yep, but sadly while that name came up in reminiscing with Josh it never really came up in the discussion. They seem really fixated on the whole concept of a "clean start" (my words).
 

I disagree on both counts.

1) If this league survives I think Nanaimo would be a shoe-in for an expansion team down the road, especially if they ever create a CanPL2.

2) Sure, diehards may come down from north of the Malahat (1- 1.5 hrs travel time is pretty standard for marketing purposes) but those diehards will come to support pro soccer or watch "big" games like when we play the Whitecaps in the VCup. They will not in any way be dissuaded by the team using "Victoria" in the name.

More importantly, NOT using Victoria in the name will signal this is a franchise that can move anywhere and be "from" nowhere. It goes against the heart of football culture which is urban-based, not regionally organized. It will make people mock the idea of pandering to "customers" rather than building a "local" club.

But to be fair, I'm an old fart and it probably won't matter. In the end the guys with the money will make the choice. 

Some fair points, but some slight misinterpretation on your part or lack of clarity on mine.

1. In terms of Nanaimo, I do love the possibility and think it would be a place to consider. However,if it is a national CPL2 depending on where the other teams are it could be logistically an issue. Imagine trying to travel from Nanaimo to [insert any location Ontario East]. If the CPL2 comes to have divisions, where there are teams in places like Kelowna, Red Deer, etc. than I agree that it would be an ideal location.

2/3. I did not say in my post that a Victoria name was a bad idea or I preferred a Vancouver Island name. I did specifically say that Victoria United is certainly better than Port City FC and BCFC. The name can have Victoria in the name and still be branded to the whole island. For example, the use of the emblem from the flag with a Victoria name can be effective. I also agree that having a Victoria name will not dissuade the fans from making the trip. From Cobble Hill/Mill Bay to Langford is only 30-35 minutes (my sister lives close to Brentwood College and the trip to Costco is barely 25 without construction delays) so it really will be not a bad trip if the times are good. 

[Footscray]

On 6/2/2018 at 3:03 PM, admin said:

masster and I are starting our own winery.  If you buy enough of it, we will start a team. 

With the cost of real estate here lately if you can afford enough land and equipment to start a winery, you probably don't need me to buy wine from you to afford a CPL team.  But I will anyway.  Unless it's swill, in which case I will send you a strong message by buying less.

[shamrock]

39 minutes ago, ktf said:

 The name can have Victoria in the name and still be branded to the whole island. For example, the use of the emblem from the flag with a Victoria name can be effective. 

I sure hope they'll go this way. You need fans from Vic first and foremost. It's like the Whitecaps being BC's team, or Impact being Quebec's team. 

[ted]

22 hours ago, masster said:

This scares me. Victoria is not big enough to withstand divisions in the soccer community. In order to draw the 5-6,000 people they are talking about, you can't have 2 different organizations competing to sell tickets and confusing the general public.

Yep, totally on point. My preference would be a merger or a buy out where the existing PDL team becomes the reserve or development team. 

 

11 hours ago, ktf said:

Some fair points, but some slight misinterpretation on your part or lack of clarity on mine.

Thanks for the clarification. You make some good points.

[GuillermoDelQuarto]

On 6/3/2018 at 6:25 PM, nolbertos said:

Cascadia was started by fan groups of Portland, Seattle and Vancouver.  If Victoria wants in, gotta get approval from all 3 supporter groups and contribute financially to it too.  

what does the financial contribution do?  (not very familiar with it)

[Blackdude]

I just don't see Victoria in Cascadia Cup for many reasons. Cascadia Cup was created as a rivalry between fans of 3 teams who played in the same league. When would Victoria play Seattle and Portland and what's in it for the American clubs? 

[Aird25]

5 minutes ago, Blackdude said:

I just don't see Victoria in Cascadia Cup for many reasons. Cascadia Cup was created as a rivalry between fans of 3 teams who played in the same league. When would Victoria play Seattle and Portland and what's in it for the American clubs? 

Agreed. A preseason tournament or something against those clubs would be fun, but I don't see how Victoria could possibly included under the current format.

[nolbertos]

26 minutes ago, GuillermoDelQuarto said:

what does the financial contribution do?  (not very familiar with it)

When the Cascadia Cup was formed all teams pitched in money for maintenance.  I believe that part of the membership fees from supporters nowadays goes to upkeeping the Cup.

Also, I forgot to say, but in order for Victoria to even get a shot at the Cascadia, they have to play against Portland and Seattle in an unofficial capacity for points. There is an unofficial table on who gets the Cascadia Cup.  Unless Victoria finds a way to MLS, can’t see them being involved.

[SpursFlu]

31 minutes ago, Blackdude said:

I just don't see Victoria in Cascadia Cup for many reasons. Cascadia Cup was created as a rivalry between fans of 3 teams who played in the same league. When would Victoria play Seattle and Portland and what's in it for the American clubs? 

In this case they'e not American teams, they're Cascadian teams. That's kinda the point 

 

It won't happen. The only way it would be if they arranged something preseason or maybe mid week friendlies. Garber would do everything in his power to stop it of course

[Watchmen]

On 6/5/2018 at 10:40 AM, SpursFlu said:

It won't happen. The only way it would be if they arranged something preseason or maybe mid week friendlies. Garber would do everything in his power to stop it of course

Garber wouldn't have to do anything.  That's just paranoia talking.  It's just not something that's not logistically feasible to.

[SpursFlu]

14 minutes ago, Watchmen said:

Garber wouldn't have to do anything.  That's just paranoia talking.  It's just not something that's not logistically feasible to.

It's logistically not feasible to play soccer games between teams that are a few hours apart?

The MLS teams I'm sure could care less to do it. So it won't happen

[BuzzAndSting]

1 minute ago, SpursFlu said:

It's logistically not feasible to play soccer games between teams that are a few hours apart?

The MLS teams I'm sure could care less to do it. So it won't happen

Edit: Nevermind, just read your previous comment.

[Watchmen]

1 hour ago, SpursFlu said:

It's logistically not feasible to play soccer games between teams that are a few hours apart?

The MLS teams I'm sure could care less to do it. So it won't happen

Between the MLS schedule, the Voyagers Cup, and usually at least one of the Cascadia teams playing in Champions League, I don't see any of the teams wanting to work in enough extra games to play Victoria in a meaningful competition.  The pre-season tournament in Portland is probably also too far in advance for what Victoria would want.  So no, I don't think it's logistically feasible to have any sort of meaningful games involving Victoria.

[Rheo]

Not much new in here but does recap some of the stadium situations in the province

http://dailyhive.com/vancouver/westhills-stadium-victoria-langdale-expansion

[Rheo]

AFTN ep 274 recap

http://aftn.ca/episode-274-the-aftn-soccer-show/

CPL talk (starts at the 12 min mark)-sorry don’t know the hosts names

-Surprise interview next week

-Say it looks like CPL won’t be Fraser Valley until 2020 at earliest

-Happy for Victoria but disappointed, but allows opportunity to learn from those that come first

-Review the stadium/pole situation

-Always long term to have two BC teams but this seemingly came up fast, cited the lack of focus group there until last weekend when previous ones were done long in advance.  They heard from both sides (league and supporters) that the focus group went really well and was helpful

-Mentioned the potential for awkwardness with the Highlander.  What the relationship will be with CPL team and the issues the team faces in the future.  Timing of the new owners announcement wasn’t a coincidence.

-Hosts were caught off guard by the one ownership group on announcement.  Still don’t know if there was a merger. 

-One host (involved in the supporters group there)  knows more but can’t talk about it now but did say “if you piece together things from social media, it’s not a hard puzzle to figure out in terms of the announcements made Canadian Soccer and the Canadian Premier League.  Rob and Dean were at these things.  You knew that they were involved.  Everyone has known they were involved for over a year”

-Other host said they didn’t discuss it out of respect to the owners’ wishes feeling they would have better leverage not doing negotiations in public.

-PCFC came out of the focus group, when related to Surrey.  Noted that all things that trademarked don’t get used.  Still an option for the future Fraser Valley team

-Talk of what happened in Fraser Valley.  Was the inability to get a stadium, mentioning the difficulty in getting land in the area.  One of the reasons they were so quiet was because they couldn’t really go public until the stadium issue was resolved.  Compared it other teams having issues (White Caps wanting new stadium by the river, White Caps 2)

-One host clarified comments of week before of the owners wanting the city (Langley/Surrey) to pay for the stadium stuff/give them land, it was misinterpreted and owners wanted the city to pay for the renovation/prep of the land not the stadium.  Was not a case of the owners wanting the land forever

-The supporters group host said the group would be making more of a noise in the future than they have previously.  Will be more visual to try and get a team there

-Unofficial talk of a shuttle to Langford, like when the Highlanders played there

[BuzzAndSting]

Apparently the behind-the-paywall Atlantic article has quotes from Rob Friend saying they’ve come to an agreement between the team, city, contractors and BC Hydro to move the pole and that the agreement will be finalized within two weeks.

[Boominbooty]

Island FC

[Rheo]

18 minutes ago, BuzzAndSting said:

Apparently the behind-the-paywall Atlantic article has quotes from Rob Friend saying they’ve come to an agreement between the team, city, contractors and BC Hydro to move the pole and that the agreement will be finalized within two weeks.

Someone put the same thing up on reddit but didn't attribute it to anyone but someone else said it was in the Athletic when I asked.

[MtlMario]

4 hours ago, Rheo said:

AFTN ep 274 recap

http://aftn.ca/episode-274-the-aftn-soccer-show/

CPL talk (starts at the 12 min mark)-sorry don’t know the hosts names

-Surprise interview next week

-Say it looks like CPL won’t be Fraser Valley until 2020 at earliest

-Happy for Victoria but disappointed, but allows opportunity to learn from those that come first

-Review the stadium/pole situation

-Always long term to have two BC teams but this seemingly came up fast, cited the lack of focus group there until last weekend when previous ones were done long in advance.  They heard from both sides (league and supporters) that the focus group went really well and was helpful

-Mentioned the potential for awkwardness with the Highlander.  What the relationship will be with CPL team and the issues the team faces in the future.  Timing of the new owners announcement wasn’t a coincidence.

-Hosts were caught off guard by the one ownership group on announcement.  Still don’t know if there was a merger. 

-One host (involved in the supporters group there)  knows more but can’t talk about it now but did say “if you piece together things from social media, it’s not a hard puzzle to figure out in terms of the announcements made Canadian Soccer and the Canadian Premier League.  Rob and Dean were at these things.  You knew that they were involved.  Everyone has known they were involved for over a year”

-Other host said they didn’t discuss it out of respect to the owners’ wishes feeling they would have better leverage not doing negotiations in public.

-PCFC came out of the focus group, when related to Surrey.  Noted that all things that trademarked don’t get used.  Still an option for the future Fraser Valley team

-Talk of what happened in Fraser Valley.  Was the inability to get a stadium, mentioning the difficulty in getting land in the area.  One of the reasons they were so quiet was because they couldn’t really go public until the stadium issue was resolved.  Compared it other teams having issues (White Caps wanting new stadium by the river, White Caps 2)

-One host clarified comments of week before of the owners wanting the city (Langley/Surrey) to pay for the stadium stuff/give them land, it was misinterpreted and owners wanted the city to pay for the renovation/prep of the land not the stadium.  Was not a case of the owners wanting the land forever

-The supporters group host said the group would be making more of a noise in the future than they have previously.  Will be more visual to try and get a team there

-Unofficial talk of a shuttle to Langford, like when the Highlanders played there

Another interesting note was (Cavalry portion) that the league is talking with a airline for sponsorship.

[Rheo]

Rob Friend on Soccer Talk pod

http://soccertalkvan.libsyn.com/soccer-talk-june-7-2018

-Got involved 2 ½ years ago.  Felt BC market was underserved, started looking into the Fraser Valley.  Contacted Victor Montagliani and he pointed him to CPL.  Blown away by the business model and was in.

-When looking into the Fraser Valley, needed to build their own stadium.  Need the perfect stadium, ie no track, not too big, not too small.  Didn’t work out in Fraser Valley in a couple of municipalities and switched to Vancouver Island.  Josh Simpson bought a house in Victoria and is moving there

-Asked about Highlanders, PDL is a great platform for college players who need a place to play and develop in the offseason.  CPL is different product.  Believes they can co-exist and align together.

-Asked about Langford being away from downtown Victoria, says the team is to serve the whole island

-Talked about smaller markets being viable and importance of pro/rel long term

- Figures 100 Canadian players for 8 teams.  They’ve been recruiting/talking to players for a year through the league soccer operations department.  Talked about players falling through the cracks and league will help find them

-He expects to be completive in the Voyageurs Cup with the MLS teams

-Asked about travel costs, already budgeted in but they are “looking at a major corporate travel sponsor that can help offset some of those costs”

-Friend will not coach but will “wear a lot of hats” in the franchise.  Believes his and Simpson’s various experiences are a big advantage.

-Talked about his new urban soccer center he owns in Vancouver

-name announcement in July

[Rheo]

17 hours ago, MtlMario said:

Another interesting note was (Cavalry portion) that the league is talking with a airline for sponsorship.

I put that recap in the Calgary thread lol.  I didn't think it was a sure thing when I listened so didn't include it but just heard Rob Friend mention it too so it must be close.

[Complete Homer]

1 hour ago, Rheo said:

- Figures 100 Canadian players for 8 teams.  They’ve been recruiting/talking to players for a year through the league soccer operations department.  Talked about players falling through the cracks and league will help find them

So 12-13 domestics per team, roughly half a standard size roster. Sounds reasonable, can always inch up as the pool deepens