2021 CPL Season General News

[gator]

53 minutes ago, dyslexic nam said:

I was just setting the record straight about the reason for the backlash.  Everyone who was here and who participated in those discussions knows what happened.  Constructive discussion - even when it is critical - is fine.  But the way he engaged in this site was entirely toxic.  

We lost some good posters who were eager to participate in CPL discussions because of OTT negativity, it is too bad!

[SoccMan]

Let’s get be real here Covid has made a mess of so many things and to tell you the truth I was very surprised that the CPL was even able to pull off that bubble in PEI.  In terms of salaries they are what they are for now and Covid has played a part in keeping the salaries at what  they are for now . Soccer in Canada just like the US is littered with corpses of folded teams and leagues and in my lifetime I’ve seen a few of them come and go. The CPL like the MLS before it and to a certain extent the MLS now have to move along doing whatever it needs to do to try and grow and survive so that it is around for the long term.  If that means lower player salaries for now so be it. What’s the alternative spending like crazy and joining the other corpses that litter the Canadian and American soccer landscapes ?  At least for now there is a league where a young player can play and try to prove himself and hopefully move on to a bigger league , moreover, if an older player still wants to keep playing and keep the dream alive of maybe still playing in a higher league then more power to him. In the end you have the rest of your life to eventually have to work at a regular real job, but only a limited time to play a sport at a certain level and actually get paid for doing it. So you start in the real work world a bit later than most big deal at least you were able to pursue a dream and live if it for awhile . This is what having the CPL is doing something that many Canadian soccer players who started playing this game from the time they could walk never had , but now it’s here, and it needs to do whatever it takes to survive and hopefully grow and prosper. If that means paying low salaries now so be it because it’s better than the alternative, spending like crazy and and eventually joining the graveyard of soccer.

Edited February 15, 2021 by SoccMan

[Shway]

2 hours ago, BuzzAndSting said:

The move from the Vs site to here was more about perception than anything.

Thanks for clarifying. 

@narduch My dad always reminded me about the word ass u me  - for these scenario’s I guess.

 

[yellowsweatygorilla]

10 minutes ago, SoccMan said:

Let’s get be real here Covid has made a mess of so many things and to tell you the truth I was very surprised that the CPL was even able to pull off that bubble in PEI.  In terms of salaries they are what they are for now and Covid has played a part in keeping the salaries at what  they are for now . 

I posted this on other platforms, but haven't seen it said here (and apologies if you've seen these same arguments made by me elsewhere). Even though I disagree that the current 10 year business plan and finances based on what I have heard does not allow for a raising of the cap, there is much that can be done to prioritize player welfare without increased spending in the mean time. Indeed, the union has offered to forego collective bargaining for the first two years in exchange for voluntary certification and multiple people involved tell me that while players are angry at salary for them their priority is having a seat at the table so that decisions aren't made unilaterally and they are consulted.

Consultation with players can allow for creative solutions that mitigates some of the stresses around how the current contracts are set up. You won't even need to reinvent the wheel - I’ve heard that HFX Wanderers intentionally builds their roster in an attempt to avoid major disparities in wages so that they are able to offer most players $30k (instead of offering a whole bunch $9-10k I’ve heard from other clubs). They’ve also made a much better effort building community partnerships, such as with fan-led restaurants to feed players (at least for 2019) and housing (other teams only provide this to international players mostly).

So for me, if the cap doesn’t increase, the priority needs to be to institute a minimum salary to ensure no individual player is barely able to make ends meet and having to rely on past savings as I have heard from one player.

Another option would be to accept that current budgets cannot sustain a professional league in terms of salaries offered. I've seen this 'Scandanavian' model suggested on twitter - have the lower end $9-15k contracts part-time instead of full-time. Yes, it'll be detrimental to football development, but at least it allows these players to supplement their meagre wages with a second job. Right now, all contracts are FT, so players can only earn extra in the three months when they're out of contract (most players pick up EI during this time).

For all those heaping criticism at the unionization effort (and I'll add that it can come off as pretty patronizing to players assuming that they aren't willing to consider league feasibility whether intended or not), I'd hope people empathize and consider creative solutions to address player welfare.

[narduch]

6 minutes ago, Shway said:

Thanks for clarifying. 

@narduch My dad always reminded me about the word ass u me  - for these scenario’s I guess.

 

The only person acting like an asshole is you.

But that's par for the course. 

[Shway]

Just now, narduch said:

The only person acting like an asshole is you.

But that's par for the course. 

Lol asshole for what? Calling out that you’re making shit up by saying someone was going to get sued (mentioning a serious matter)

As far as I see it, what I said aligns with the sentiment more than your baseless comment. 

But its okay I’ll be the wise ass .

 

[narduch]

9 minutes ago, Shway said:

Lol asshole for what? Calling out that you’re making shit up by saying someone was going to get sued (mentioning a serious matter)

As far as I see it, what I said aligns with the sentiment more than your baseless comment. 

But its okay I’ll be the wise ass .

 

LOL. 

I didn't make anything up. That is literally what Jamie wrote in that thread.

Just because it doesn't line up with your our reality isn't my problem.

[Bison44]

Knashing our teeth about the players share of the pie and whether its sustainable doesnt seem to be pertinent, considering the whole pie/league could go under if we have another year of no fans.  If the teams continue to have a fraction of the income generated in year one, the players are likely either going to be out of a job or taking pay cuts.  

I'm still troubled by one of Rollins first tweets about this was predicting CPL would soon start bleeding players to USL.  Based on SIssoko jumping to one of the more ambitious USL teams with higher aspirations.  How many well off high paying USL teams are there, 5-6??  The majority of USL-C will probably be in as bad or worse situations as the CPL teams.  

[MM3/MM2/MM]

57 minutes ago, yellowsweatygorilla said:

For all those heaping criticism at the unionization effort (and I'll add that it can come off as pretty patronizing to players assuming that they aren't willing to consider league feasibility whether intended or not), I'd hope people empathize and consider creative solutions to address player welfare.

I don't think I've seen much criticism on unionization here and I think most approve.  I think there is just caution on how quickly wages can rise, with very little income in  2020 and the delay of expansion.  I'm personally in favor of unions and the MLS players union is a good example of the ability to work with the league.  We all want the league to succeed and for the players to be fairly compensated, it may take some time, hopefully not too much.

[The Real Marc]

2 hours ago, yellowsweatygorilla said:

Another option would be to accept that current budgets cannot sustain a professional league in terms of salaries offered. I've seen this 'Scandanavian' model suggested on twitter - have the lower end $9-15k contracts part-time instead of full-time. Yes, it'll be detrimental to football development, but at least it allows these players to supplement their meagre wages with a second job. Right now, all contracts are FT, so players can only earn extra in the three months when they're out of contract (most players pick up EI during this time).

Do bottom-end CanPL contracts actually try to stop players from having other non-soccer jobs? I can't imagine this would be the case.

Despite their early rhetoric about building a living-wage FT league that feeds the Nats, yeah that's a nice line but I'm sorta surprised people bought it.  The dollars and cents (COVID or not) of a league like this doesn't add up to having too many guys in the 40k-50k range, particularly in the early years of the league - that's what's likely needed to keep players like Carreiro or Gasparotto in the game. Other than the odd guy like Bekker (it'd be interesting to see what he's pulling in), this league was always going to be a launching pad, landing strip, or an adventure for the vast majority of players for the first five to ten years IMHO.

 

Edited February 16, 2021 by The Real Marc

[SthMelbRed]

2 minutes ago, The Real Marc said:

Do bottom-end CAnPL contracts actually try to stop players from having other non-soccer jobs? I can['t imagine this would be the case.

I can't see any player contracts expressly forbidding or discouraging non-soccer, second jobs. However, training and match schedules might make most jobs out of reach for players in practical terms.

[yellowsweatygorilla]

10 minutes ago, The Real Marc said:

Do bottom-end CanPL contracts actually try to stop players from having other non-soccer jobs? I can't imagine this would be the case.

Despite their early rhetoric about building a living-wage FT league that feeds the Nats, yeah that's a nice line but I'm sorta surprised people bought it.  The dollars and cents (COVID or not) of a league like this doesn't add up to having too many guys in the 40k-50k range, particularly in the early years of the league - that's what's likely needed to keep players like Carreiro or Gasparotto in the game. Other than the odd guy like Bekker (it'd be interesting to see what he's pulling in), this league was always going to be a launching pad, landing strip, or an adventure for the vast majority of players for the first five to ten years IMHO.

 

Well, I suppose someone could ... but this a full time job, along with training and matches (let alone travel), it's 40+ hours a week. There actually are players that might do additional coaching after practice for pay, but it's not really feasible. What I am suggesting instead is that if they're going to pay someone $10k for the season, have less trainings, so that a player can work 2 days out of the week, and/or have trainings in the evenings after work like non-league.

Yea, Bekker, along with maybe 4-5 players are outliers.

[The Real Marc]

That makes sense. I hadn't realized those low-end contracts were truly FT. That's like the old days of Football Manager when you could manage a lower league team and sign guys for peanuts like 175 Euros a week on "full time contracts" - I always thought this was a glitch, I didn't realize this was for real!

Edited February 16, 2021 by The Real Marc

[yothat2]

What do players in the cebl make ?! I m sure it's the exact same as the cpl 

 

Then they get the offseason to land an offer in Europe. This league is a startup. 

 

Ask fcedmontin owner how many profitable seasons he has had in the last ten years .. 100% it's 0. MLS took 20 years to get a decent wage level 

[Kent]

Is the job actually 40 hours? I agree with the idea that it is likely hard to fit in another job during the season, but I'd be surprised if it is actually a 40+ hour work week, even with the travel. I don't remember the numbers exactly, but I remember being surprised a few years ago when mlssoccer.com posted an article about when an MLS player's schedule is like. I feel like a lot of days were something like 2 hours or maybe 4 hours. You can only work out so much, and I'm sure it gets to a point where too much video review is just a wasted effort (can you imagine being coached for like 6 hours a day in a classroom?)

I know you included travel in the 40+ hour weeks, so maaaaybe the travel makes the difference, but it might take something like a bus ride from Hamilton to Halifax to get there.

But yeah, I'm pro-union, pro-benefit-of-the-doubt on the low salaries at this point. Let's see when fans are allowed back in, and what kind of numbers we see. I already had been assuming year 2 would have a downturn in attendance before COVID came along, but add to it that there may be people who have lots of new reasons to not go to games (worse financial situation, fear, were accidentally weened off of attending pro sports during the lockdown). Let's see how the league recovers.

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

15 hours ago, yellowsweatygorilla said:

...Another option would be to accept that current budgets cannot sustain a professional league in terms of salaries offered. I've seen this 'Scandanavian' model suggested on twitter - have the lower end $9-15k contracts part-time instead of full-time....

Just to explain what I was referring to with that unlike the UK where semi-pro means train two evenings a week lower level teams in Scandinavia often manage to have a training session five days a week alongside players working a regular job. A core of import signings can potentially be fully pro so you wind up with a hybrid sort of approach that combines fully and semi-pro players. Full-time teams in many countries usually (have heard of clubs in some countries doing two sessions a day but it is far from the norm) don't train for much more than a couple of hours so the hours in soccer don't necessarily equate to a regular 40 hours a week job and players often do have a lot of free time on their hands.

Let's get real about this. There's absolutely no way you can realistically make ends meet in terms of having an apartment and vehicle of your own and living the lifestyle most young adults would aspire to in a large Canadian city with $9-15k, so if that's what really is on offer and they are not providing accomodation they clearly are expecting at least some of their domestic players to be doing something else on the side like bar and restaurant work etc where the hours worked can fit around soccer.

At that point it isn't really completely fully pro and more like the hybrid Scandinavian approach described above and it should be no surprise to see players dropping out after a couple of seasons to start another career path outside the sport once they can see that they aren't registering on the radar of clubs elsewhere that will pay big money. Nothing wrong with this approach if that's what is genuinely sustainable and everybody is being up front and transparent about it, but when you have the commish running around talking about $150 million from Mediapro and generally trying to project the image of being a relatively big budget D1 it's unlikely to be a recipe for harmony on the labour relations front.

Edited February 16, 2021 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[yellowsweatygorilla]

1 hour ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Just to explain what I was referring to with that unlike the UK where semi-pro means train two evenings a week lower level teams in Scandinavia often manage to have a training session five days a week alongside players working a regular job. 

Wait, so in Scandinavia, it's still 40 hour week at the football club? 

In that case, I think the English nonleague model for lower end contracts is preferable

Edited February 16, 2021 by yellowsweatygorilla

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

44 minutes ago, yellowsweatygorilla said:

Wait, so in Scandinavia, it's still 40 hour week at the football club?

No, probably well under 10 hours through the week plus a game on the weekend. Even fully pro clubs are usually not at it for more than relatively brief morning training sessions, so it will usually be nothing even close to 40 hours Mon-Fri even in that context. Most of player's energy gets focused into 90 minutes of game time and everything else is about preparation and being fresh for that.

The daily training session in the Scandinavian format could easily just be an hour or ninety minutes. The way I heard it described in a Si Ferry youtube clip (Scottish footballer, you would probably need subtitles) from memory it sounded like players would be doing this between finishing their regular job and going home for the evening.

The UK format of semi-pro is usually two evenings a week probably after you have already been home for a bit after work and you'll find something broadly similar to that going on in Canada in top amateur leagues, etc.

Edited February 16, 2021 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[yellowsweatygorilla]

11 minutes ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

No, probably well under 10 hours through the week plus a game on the weekend. Even fully pro clubs are usually not at it for more than relatively brief morning training sessions, so it will usually be nothing even close to 40 hours Mon-Fri even in that context. Most of player's energy gets focused into 90 minutes of game time and everything else is about preparation and being fresh for that.

The daily training session in the Scandinavian format could easily just be an hour or ninety minutes. The way I heard it described in a Si Ferry youtube clip (Scottish footballer, you would probably need subtitles) from memory it sounded like players would be doing this between finishing their regular job and going home for the evening.

The UK format of semi-pro is usually two evenings a week probably after you have already been home for a bit after work and you'll find something broadly similar to that going on in Canada in top amateur leagues, etc.

Someone mentioned to me that Simmons was working on the side while in Sweden.

I know even in England Sixth division, a lot of teams have 2-5 fulltime players, and they make a salary of $25k CAD-ish, with the rest of the squad being part-timers earning CanPL lower end rates. At these salary budget levels, it seems more ethical to go part-time and give players more options.

I also wouldn't mind seeing more player-coaches too. Seems a good fit for older vets coming home (Webb and Matt Lam are out of contract right now). The league can offer to pay for coaching badges (as with the current program) and supplement the player wages with coaching wages (though clearly the league is also skimping on that considering the tiny coaching teams with each club). All in all, I just need the league to be more creative if it's going to spend so little on salaries versus pretending that they're offering a professional league akin to other countries. This is best achieved by having players on board to help determine a preferable arrangement.

Edited February 16, 2021 by yellowsweatygorilla

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

Simmons would have been fine working at whatever in Sweden when the UK was in the EU. Imports into Canada that don't have PR status will only legally be able to do what's on their work visa, so they will need to get enough to realistically live on. If CanPL are only paying $9-12k to a lot of the CanCon part of the roster then I'd be amazed if doing something on the side isn't happening a lot. The league will be very keen to project the image of being fully pro with daily training sessions but there are still plenty of hours in the day available to do something else.

Edited February 16, 2021 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[yellowsweatygorilla]

21 minutes ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Simmons would have been fine working at whatever in Sweden when the UK was in the EU. Imports into Canada that don't have PR status will only legally be able to do what's on their work visa, so they will need to get enough to realistically live on. If CanPL are only paying $9-12k to a lot of the CanCon part of the roster then I'd be amazed if doing something on the side isn't happening a lot. The league will be very keen to project the image of being fully pro with daily training sessions but there are still plenty of hours in the day available to do something else.

From what I hear only a couple players are working side jobs during the season as most find it too strenuous with the daily training sessions and travel. That's why I'd rather go the non-league route and switch to the two training sessions a week (without lowering the already low existing contracts).

For experienced veteran Canadians and internationals, they can remain fulltime with appropriate living wage salaries.

[Big_M]

two sessions a week is a joke for the only national league of a country..gotta have 4-5 sessions and with that those not making enough can go do a part time job of 15 hours..specially that in large majority those are youngsters so they have the energy for it..if they really want it they will just push harder to get a full time contract

[CPLinsider]

From what I understand, practices for some of the CanPL teams are held early (6:30 or 7am) in the morning so that they still fall before the "traditional" 9-5 workday. This allows players to have part-time jobs during the day; I know for a fact that during my time in AB, there was a certain Spanish International for FCE who was doing some academy coaching for cash on the side.

I believe that the CFL is similar in that some players also keep part-time jobs, even if they're just for the offseason. If I'm not mistaken, a redeeming quality of the CFL is that the contracts are year-round so players continue to be paid bi-weekly for the 52 weeks of the year as opposed to the NFL where players are only paid for the 16 weeks of the season.

[yellowsweatygorilla]

18 minutes ago, Big_M said:

two sessions a week is a joke for the only national league of a country..gotta have 4-5 sessions and with that those not making enough can go do a part time job of 15 hours..specially that in large majority those are youngsters so they have the energy for it..if they really want it they will just push harder to get a full time contract

I agree that 2 sessions is a joke for a 'professional league', but if you can't pay people properly, the least you can do is lower the workload. For me it's more of a joke having our players work 60 hour work weeks .. terrible physically and mentally .. noone should be put through that and considering it's technically illegal outside of certain workspaces like shelters to work such long hours in one job, why should it be ok spread out into multiple jobs?

[Big_M]

again, four sessions and one game in terms of hours is part time..so if you cant pay someone full time salary for that theres nothing wrong with him getting a part time job