CPL new teams speculation

[Watchmen]

4 hours ago, narduch said:

Is it actual 100% fact that Vancouver and Montreal could not get new US League sanctioning.

Or is it internet speculation and or rumour.

Vancouver was trying to sell/relocate WFC2 to Calgary, but were blocked from doing so by the CSA, since the CPL was in progress.  At that point, the team was folded (or sold? I forget which) and the affiliate deal was set up with Fresno.

[Stoppage Time]

I have no problem at all with the three Canadian MLS teams fielding teams in the CPL. The initial benefits are plain to see. The CPL could, by including Saskatoon, quickly grow to 12 team which is a good goal and one which could be held as an upper limit for some years.  Partnerships could evolve. How about Alex Bunbury  and his group partner with FC Snowflake (Montreal)? Would soccer fans in the Fraser Valley support a CPL team associated with VWFC? Probably! After all, the Canucks will have its farm team in Abbotsford next season, and everybody is excited.  Finally, TFC could, with a partner group, place a team somewhere in the GTA or in London or Kitchener/Waterloo. This could work!                       

All that is needed are some sensible limits. For example, an MLS "farm" team could be allowed to field not more than two senior team players at a time, perhaps with a threshold of MLS minutes or games played to define eligibility. An MLS player could be limited as to the number of games they can play in the CPL squad. A salary luxury tax could be paid to other CPL clubs if an MLS affiliate parks big salary on the farm. There are other ways to even the organizational field.

What is needed is some out of the box thinking in support of Canadian soccer interests. I, for one, would rather watch CPL matches than watch third tier teams from the US play a "Whitecaps reserve" team - better rivalries, more Canadian players to watch, and it is not an American league in Canada, so no sanctioning issues. 

 

Why not, folks?

[Kent]

1 hour ago, Stoppage Time said:

Why not, folks?

How about the Calgary example above? Vancouver wanted a team in Calgary. The CSA refused, and as a result we now have an independent team in Calgary doing very well in the CPL instead of a Calgary Whitecaps in USL, or a reserve team playing in our top league.

[Kent]

I'd like to suggest that this potential new reserve league be called MMLS for "Minor Major League Soccer".

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

13 hours ago, rydermike said:

I feel like it'll be a joint venture with USL...

All the indications are that they are applying for a separate USSF D3 sanctioning from that of USL-L1. Being able to find a way to deal with sanctioning issues in a Canadian context appears to be part of their motivation but there also appear to be concerns over whether USL is providing a suitable development environment for their best prospects in the 18-20 junior hockey sort of age range.

From a CSA standpoint this means up to 40 extra top Canadian  prospects emerging from the MLS academies in Vancouver and Montreal and being trained in a genuinely fully pro environment for a level directly relevant to the CanMNT in playing standard terms. If they sign their first pro contract in this context there is the added bonus that they become domestic players across the entire league for the rest of their careers.

If that happens where does that leave CanPL in CanMNT player pathway terms, if there are no fully funded merit only rather than pay-to-play academies in place in that context and most of the reasonably livable contracts are being aimed either at foreign U-23 players they think they can resell through a Moneyball strategy or older players like Kyle Becker that barely even register on the CanMNT's radar in selection terms?

MLS isn't going away so CanPL would have been much better served finding a way to work with it to mutual advantage rather than pretending to be something they are not in domestic player development terms.

Edited June 4, 2021 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[Watchmen]

8 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

All the indications are that they are applying for a separate USSF D3 sanctioning from that of USL-L1. Being able to find a way to deal with sanctioning issues in a Canadian context appears to be part of their motivation but there also appear to be concerns over whether USL is providing a suitable development environment for their best prospects in the 18-20 junior hockey sort of age range.

From a CSA standpoint this means up to 40 extra top Canadian  prospects emerging from the MLS academies in Vancouver and Montreal and being trained in a genuinely fully pro environment for a level directly relevant to the CanMNT in playing standard terms. If they sign their first pro contract in this context there is the added bonus that they become domestic players across the entire league for the rest of their careers.

If that happens where does that leave CanPL in CanMNT player pathway terms, if there are no fully funded merit only rather than pay-to-play academies in place in that context and most of the reasonably livable contracts are being aimed either at foreign U-23 players they think they can resell through a Moneyball strategy or older players like Kyle Becker that barely even register on the CanMNT's radar in selection terms?

MLS isn't going away so CanPL would have been much better served finding a way to work with it to mutual advantage rather than pretending to be something they are not in domestic player development terms.

I would welcome 40 additional spots for developing Canadian players. The CPL would be unaffected. They'd still be where they are now - scouring the country for players the MLS academies missed, and providing a second chance to some of those 40 players who don't make the next step up to MLS. With or without academies in the 3 major markets, the CPL is always going to be a tough sell in those locations.

[longlugan]

9 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

All the indications are that they are applying for a separate USSF D3 sanctioning from that of USL-L1. Being able to find a way to deal with sanctioning issues in a Canadian context appears to be part of their motivation but there also appear to be concerns over whether USL is providing a suitable development environment for their best prospects in the 18-20 junior hockey sort of age range.

From a CSA standpoint this means up to 40 extra top Canadian  prospects emerging from the MLS academies in Vancouver and Montreal and being trained in a genuinely fully pro environment for a level directly relevant to the CanMNT in playing standard terms. If they sign their first pro contract in this context there is the added bonus that they become domestic players across the entire league for the rest of their careers.

If that happens where does that leave CanPL in CanMNT player pathway terms, if there are no fully funded merit only rather than pay-to-play academies in place in that context and most of the reasonably livable contracts are being aimed either at foreign U-23 players they think they can resell through a Moneyball strategy or older players like Kyle Becker that barely even register on the CanMNT's radar in selection terms?

MLS isn't going away so CanPL would have been much better served finding a way to work with it to mutual advantage rather than pretending to be something they are not in domestic player development terms.

And the douchebag comes out of hibernation once again. Have a good sleep? Time to hitch your wagons onto the USSF again and show what a great supporter of Canadian soccer you are. You are nothing if not predictable 🤣🤣🤣🤣

[narduch]

21 minutes ago, longlugan said:

And the douchebag comes out of hibernation once again. Have a good sleep? Time to hitch your wagons onto the USSF again and show what a great supporter of Canadian soccer you are. You are nothing if not predictable 🤣🤣🤣🤣

He really is a one trick pony.

[Aird25]

1 hour ago, Watchmen said:

providing a second chance to some of those 40 players who don't make the next step up to MLS.

Which will likely be the vast majority of those players. Just look at how many players in the CPL or USL right now were at one point part of Canadian MLS reserve or academy teams. Look how many are in lower leagues around the world, or aren't even in the game anymore. It seems bizarre to think that having more Canadians in a professional environment is somehow going to be bad for CPL. 

This should all really be in another thread though as it has nothing to do with new CPL teams

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

1 hour ago, Watchmen said:

...scouring the country for players the MLS academies missed, and providing a second chance to some of those 40 players who don't make the next step up to MLS...

Basically agree with that analysis obviously but worth bearing in mind that Pacific FC picked up some players in 2019 (Campbell, Verhoeven, Baldisimo and Hernandez) that may not have been on the market yet in terms of not making that next step up if the Whitecaps still had a TFC II style fully pro U-23 setup in Vancouver after the Fresno fiasco. There was some talk on here that the Whitecaps were not happy about that at the time.

[m-g-williams]

For what it's worth, I really think we should focus on filling out the Canadian soccer pyramid rather than expanding the already bloated US one. BC still seems en route to deliver a DIII league, It was only a few weeks ago we were hearing about some kind of DII league, and as the CPL becomes more firmly established financially and expands, I think we'll see the DI able to provide much more support investing in DII and DIII. If we can get our own house in order, I really see that negating any need/interest in having to rely on the US. 

MLS aside, US leagues seem to be coming and going with the tide. Let's not wade into this mess. 

[Bison44]

2 minutes ago, m-g-williams said:

MLS aside, US leagues seem to be coming and going with the tide. Let's not wade into this mess. 

Agree, but TFC2 is already in there, it would be a lateral move for them.   And as someone who actually watches USL-C, and USL-1, having a team in USL-1 is nothing to brag about.  Its better than no team and having those MLS academy guys rot, but it wont be like the old WC2 and FCMontreal from years back.  Look at Perruza, tore up USL-1, there was no reason for a "good prospect" to be there and they still had to move him to a USL-C loan for competition.  

And I wish one of the VAN guys would step up, I remember arguing with them about keeping the team going and the 5-6mil a season cost was thrown around.  With a ton of money going out the window and very little return. I dont see whats changed you still need somewhere to play, still have 800 fans (no income).  Blah Blah sanctioning blah blah, but TFC dropped to small seat venue and USL-1, if that was an option and WC2 didnt go for it then, why now? When you can loan out some of the better guys to CPL or USL-C??  Weird and this is all off speculation from some tweets, when we could be talking about new CPL teams.  Ie Saskatoon!!! WOO HOOO!!!!  

[CDNFootballer]

23 hours ago, Stoppage Time said:

I have no problem at all with the three Canadian MLS teams fielding teams in the CPL. The initial benefits are plain to see. The CPL could, by including Saskatoon, quickly grow to 12 team which is a good goal and one which could be held as an upper limit for some years.  Partnerships could evolve. How about Alex Bunbury  and his group partner with FC Snowflake (Montreal)? Would soccer fans in the Fraser Valley support a CPL team associated with VWFC? Probably! After all, the Canucks will have its farm team in Abbotsford next season, and everybody is excited.  Finally, TFC could, with a partner group, place a team somewhere in the GTA or in London or Kitchener/Waterloo. This could work!                      

Why not, folks?

A few reasons, it undermines and devalues Canada's Div1 CPL by allowing USA's Div1 to have a farm/reserve team in it. Optics would be terrible, and no, fans in the Fraser Valley wouldn't support the Caps minor league farm/reserve team just cause its in CPL, just look at WCFC2 in USL who drew an "announced" and pathetic 869 per game last year in that US league. Even in USL the fans are mostly smart enough not to care about their independent teams playing fake farm teams and reserve teams when they come to town. CPL as a Div1 league smartly wants to maintain/foster a big league image not a bush/minor league one.

Canada finally has a Div 1 National League that is doing things right and CPL has made the right moves by not allowing farm/reserve/development teams into Canada's Div 1 league.

It will grow over the years just like MLS did from their humble beginnings.

 

[Stoppage Time]

Interesting discussion. I agree with poster  m-g-williams who says, "we should focus on filling out the Canadian soccer pyramid rather than expanding the already bloated US one." 

I have to think that if there was a will, the CSA and the CPL could find a way to include the "reserve teams" of Canada's MLS teams. Again, I suggest limits on the number of first team players on a game day roster, and/or a limit on the number of minutes first team players can play collectively over a season. Furthermore, the location of the team would have to be in a viable market. In addition, partnerships between each of the three Canadian  MLS clubs, preferably as minority partner affiliates, and a local ownership group such as, for example, Alex Bunbury, would be required so as to prevent too much of a MLS influence on the CPL. Canadian player roster and minute and U-21 minute rules would apply to the "MLS reserve" sides as they presently do to CPL clubs.

Bottom line: The three Canadian MLS clubs need reserve teams. CPL needs to expand. CPL/CSA can create practical and fair rules to allow the three MLS sides to field reserve teams in CPL. Add Saskatoon and you have 12 CPL sides which would provide a much increased opportunity for young Canadians. Instead of, for example, VWFC youngsters languishing without proper competition, they would play week in and week out and that is a big thing.

[Cheeta]

CPL is an absolute God send to the Canadian MLS teams and both leagues know it.   

As far as player development is concerned the relationships between the two leagues and the clubs there in are evolving and will continue to evolve on a case by case basis as opportunity and merit justify. 

I see zero advantage to CPL in expanding the role the league has so far played in being a development tool for MLS property.  Zero.  Anything further than the couple of MLS players being brought in on loan to meet a CPL teams needs would be bad politics for the CPL.  To my mind anyway. 

MLS roster players who can't find field time will find their way to field time by moving on, enjoying their brief careers making money not to play or regret not having been braver after it's come time to hang up the boots. 

  

[Stoppage Time]

I have to wonder if there are enough young Canadians in MLS who get enough opportunity to play enough minutes to develop enough to earn enough regular playing time to further their careers. I know that TFC supporters have not been happy that Priso and Okello, for example, do not get time when guys like Delgado or Deleon play lots of minutes. Would those young guys develop better training with TFC or playing regularly in CPL? I do not rate TFC II as a great way to develop young Canadians (yes, I admit that I have never seen them play live, but many of you have I am guessing).

 

[Unnamed Trialist]

All this MLS II talk obscures the real issue: the CPL will absolutely need to be thinking about player development. Probably in an academy model.

Right now the cost of doing this is probably prohibitive, and there is no consensus on a league model. As I see it, we need to use CPL to lever a path for teens, addressing whatever limitations seen now with high performance leagues.

The D3 leagues and U-Sports play a role, but it is not the same as a club developing their own players, with the rights to them as well as sell-on privileges.

I also realise that since CPL is league with rules encouraging minutes for young players, this creates another difficulty: if MLS "youth" is u-23, CPL youth would probably be U-19, U-18. That means high school kids who may need funds to move away from home and still need to finish school. 

The way to deal with this, at least at first, is to sign local kids. But that would soon be a problem, as soon as Victoria see a Lower Mainland kid, Halifax see someone in Moncton, you are back to the problem of paying for that.

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

19 hours ago, Stoppage Time said:

... Again, I suggest limits on the number of first team players on a game day roster, and/or a limit on the number of minutes first team players can play collectively over a season. Furthermore, the location of the team would have to be in a viable market. In addition, partnerships between each of the three Canadian  MLS clubs, preferably as minority partner affiliates, and a local ownership group such as, ...

There definitely are ways it could have been done rationally to mutual benefit that would not have been a reserve team drawing 200 or so actual as opposed to announced in the MLS market.

It's clear that there is a lot of bad blood between the two parties so it's safe to assume that CanPL actually prefers not to have many of the best CanMNT level prospects on board at some point during their rise to the top so they can push this narrative about being the one true Canadian D1 league in outright opposition to MLS. Bob Young in particular seems very keen on that angle.

Before the league's launch there was a lot of the rhetoric that implied that there were a lot of Canadian players being denied an opportunity in MLS because of domestic player rules and that this was damaging the national team in the run up to 2026. That's now been shown to be false. There's plenty of Nationwide Conference level talent that can provide entertaining and watchable pro level soccer but almost no CanMNT level talent has been uncovered by CanPL that was being held back because of that.

13 hours ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

All this MLS II talk obscures the real issue: the CPL will absolutely need to be thinking about player development. Probably in an academy model...

This is where the recent saga on pathetically low salary numbers for young Canadians while they target a significant portion of their salary cap at foreign U-23 players of dubious quality approved by some agency in London, England should be highlighted.

There appears to be a CFL mentality of needing a large quota of domestic players for nationalism related our balls are bigger type marketing purposes (let's wheel in a former Tim Hortons exec to extol the virtues of our rock 'em sock 'em brand of soccer that Canadians can respect etc) but at the same time relying very heavily on non-Canadians to achieve a quality entertainment product.

The thing is though that there is a lot more competition globally for pro level talent in soccer than in gridiron and their salary budget is so low that it's far from clear that the players they are bringing in are a significant upgrade on what's readily available on their doorstep.

When I watch a young Belgian third division backup level goalkeeper like Mathias Janssens unable to come out for crosses that should have been his all day long, the only thing I am wondering is how on earth they couldn't find somebody as good as this kid from the local Winnipeg amateur and youth leagues never mind MLS academy rosters.

I thought the lesson they would draw from season one would be that they could rely more on local players and that they would target more of the available resources at them but instead they doubled down on the imports and Bob Young seems to think or has been successfully convinced that they can emulate Billy Beane in Moneyball that way.

It's counter-intuitive for a lot of posters on here but the money MLS pours into the academies in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal does much more for the CanMNT than CanPL is ever likely to as things stand at the moment.

Edited June 6, 2021 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[longlugan]

9 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

There definitely are ways it could have been done rationally to mutual benefit that would not have been a reserve team drawing 200 or so actual as opposed to announced in the MLS market.

It's clear that there is a lot of bad blood between the two parties so it's safe to assume that CanPL actually prefers not to have many of the best CanMNT level prospects on board at some point during their rise to the top so they can push this narrative about being the one true Canadian D1 league in outright opposition to MLS. Bob Young in particular seems very keen on that angle.

Before the league's launch there was a lot of the rhetoric that implied that there were a lot of Canadian players being denied an opportunity in MLS because of domestic player rules and that this was damaging the national team in the run up to 2026. That's now been shown to be false. There's plenty of Nationwide Conference level talent that can provide entertaining and watchable pro level soccer but almost no CanMNT level talent has been uncovered by CanPL that was being held back because of that.

This is where the recent saga on pathetically low salary numbers for young Canadians while they target a significant portion of their salary cap at foreign U-23 players of dubious quality approved by some agency in London, England should be highlighted.

There appears to be a CFL mentality of needing a large quota of domestic players for nationalism related our balls are bigger type marketing purposes (let's wheel in a former Tim Hortons exec to extol the virtues of our rock 'em sock 'em brand of soccer that Canadians can respect etc) but at the same time relying very heavily on non-Canadians to achieve a quality entertainment product.

The thing is though that there is a lot more competition globally for pro level talent in soccer than in gridiron and their salary budget is so low that it's far from clear that the players they are bringing in are a significant upgrade on what's readily available on their doorstep.

When I watch a young Belgian third division backup level goalkeeper like Mathias Janssens unable to come out for crosses that should have been his all day long, the only thing I am wondering is how on earth they couldn't find somebody as good as this kid from the local Winnipeg amateur and youth leagues never mind MLS academy rosters.

I thought the lesson they would draw from season one would be that they could rely more on local players and that they would target more of the available resources at them but instead they doubled down on the imports and Bob Young seems to think or has been successfully convinced that they can emulate Billy Beane in Moneyball that way.

It's counter-intuitive for a lot of posters on here but the money MLS pours into the academies in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal does much more for the CanMNT than CanPL is ever likely to as things stand at the moment.

This is what makes you such a mental midget. You talk about the CPL as if it were some established league and then point out all of it's faults(according to you). You also complain about the supposed biased narrative towards(or against) the MLS and how it's damaging Canadian soccer because it's not providing manpower for the national team yet. What you fail to point out though is that the CPL has only played two seasons so far(one of them in a bubble) and that the only narrative being pushed around here is your pro USSF and anti-CPL one. Whereas almost everyone else on here understands the need for MLS and it's academies and it's place in the hierarchy of the Canadian soccer pyramid you view the CPL as a useless endeavor unless it hitches it's wagon to the USSF system. Why do you even bother coming on here? Just take your sorry ass to the USSF and have yourself a massive circle jerk with like-minded asswipes.

[narduch]

21 minutes ago, longlugan said:

This is what makes you such a mental midget. You talk about the CPL as if it were some established league and then point out all of it's faults(according to you). You also complain about the supposed biased narrative towards(or against) the MLS and how it's damaging Canadian soccer because it's not providing manpower for the national team yet. What you fail to point out though is that the CPL has only played two seasons so far(one of them in a bubble) and that the only narrative being pushed around here is your pro USSF and anti-CPL one. Whereas almost everyone else on here understands the need for MLS and it's academies and it's place in the hierarchy of the Canadian soccer pyramid you view the CPL as a useless endeavor unless it hitches it's wagon to the USSF system. Why do you even bother coming on here? Just take your sorry ass to the USSF and have yourself a massive circle jerk with like-minded asswipes.

You have to figure part of it has to do with the trolling aspect. He keeps posting this shit because he likes baiting others.

I still find it a bit crazy that it is the only topic he is interested in. So much other Canadian soccer topics to discuss and this is the only 1 he cares about.

Although he did post a few items about Suriname yesterday. Which was more borderline trolling too.

[Unnamed Trialist]

19 minutes ago, narduch said:

You have to figure part of it has to do with the trolling aspect. He keeps posting this shit because he likes baiting others.

I still find it a bit crazy that it is the only topic he is interested in. So much other Canadian soccer topics to discuss and this is the only 1 he cares about.

Although he did post a few items about Suriname yesterday. Which was more borderline trolling too.

I'm pretty sure that before the CPL he posted about other things. 

The only things that you should be trolling about when it comes to Canadian soccer are, in this order:

-The CSA is run in an amateur manner and holds back our program.

-The Provincial associations, ditto.

-We have no properly organised development structure for Canadian soccer

-None of the above but pretty well everything else about the Whitecaps

[Ansem]

On 6/5/2021 at 1:16 PM, Stoppage Time said:

Interesting discussion. I agree with poster  m-g-williams who says, "we should focus on filling out the Canadian soccer pyramid rather than expanding the already bloated US one." 

I have to think that if there was a will, the CSA and the CPL could find a way to include the "reserve teams" of Canada's MLS teams. Again, I suggest limits on the number of first team players on a game day roster, and/or a limit on the number of minutes first team players can play collectively over a season. Furthermore, the location of the team would have to be in a viable market. In addition, partnerships between each of the three Canadian  MLS clubs, preferably as minority partner affiliates, and a local ownership group such as, for example, Alex Bunbury, would be required so as to prevent too much of a MLS influence on the CPL. Canadian player roster and minute and U-21 minute rules would apply to the "MLS reserve" sides as they presently do to CPL clubs.

Bottom line: The three Canadian MLS clubs need reserve teams. CPL needs to expand. CPL/CSA can create practical and fair rules to allow the three MLS sides to field reserve teams in CPL. Add Saskatoon and you have 12 CPL sides which would provide a much increased opportunity for young Canadians. Instead of, for example, VWFC youngsters languishing without proper competition, they would play week in and week out and that is a big thing.

Sir, why do you hate yourself?

[Ansem]

13 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

There definitely are ways it could have been done rationally to mutual benefit that would not have been a reserve team drawing 200 or so actual as opposed to announced in the MLS market.

It's clear that there is a lot of bad blood between the two parties so it's safe to assume that CanPL actually prefers not to have many of the best CanMNT level prospects on board at some point during their rise to the top so they can push this narrative about being the one true Canadian D1 league in outright opposition to MLS. Bob Young in particular seems very keen on that angle.

Before the league's launch there was a lot of the rhetoric that implied that there were a lot of Canadian players being denied an opportunity in MLS because of domestic player rules and that this was damaging the national team in the run up to 2026. That's now been shown to be false. There's plenty of Nationwide Conference level talent that can provide entertaining and watchable pro level soccer but almost no CanMNT level talent has been uncovered by CanPL that was being held back because of that.

This is where the recent saga on pathetically low salary numbers for young Canadians while they target a significant portion of their salary cap at foreign U-23 players of dubious quality approved by some agency in London, England should be highlighted.

There appears to be a CFL mentality of needing a large quota of domestic players for nationalism related our balls are bigger type marketing purposes (let's wheel in a former Tim Hortons exec to extol the virtues of our rock 'em sock 'em brand of soccer that Canadians can respect etc) but at the same time relying very heavily on non-Canadians to achieve a quality entertainment product.

The thing is though that there is a lot more competition globally for pro level talent in soccer than in gridiron and their salary budget is so low that it's far from clear that the players they are bringing in are a significant upgrade on what's readily available on their doorstep.

When I watch a young Belgian third division backup level goalkeeper like Mathias Janssens unable to come out for crosses that should have been his all day long, the only thing I am wondering is how on earth they couldn't find somebody as good as this kid from the local Winnipeg amateur and youth leagues never mind MLS academy rosters.

I thought the lesson they would draw from season one would be that they could rely more on local players and that they would target more of the available resources at them but instead they doubled down on the imports and Bob Young seems to think or has been successfully convinced that they can emulate Billy Beane in Moneyball that way.

It's counter-intuitive for a lot of posters on here but the money MLS pours into the academies in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal does much more for the CanMNT than CanPL is ever likely to as things stand at the moment.

Great...another one who hates himself 

I'd rather we talk expansions than this nonsense that has been argued to death 

Edited June 6, 2021 by Ansem

[toontownman]

Anyone want to talk about John Van 't Schip?

[narduch]

Just now, toontownman said:

Anyone want to talk about John Van 't Schip?

Who's he coaching now