The Importance of the Players vs CSA Pay Dispute

[CanadaFan123]

That strike in hindsight was so bullshit by the players. Whatever the CSA lost should be taken out of their cut. I don’t give a shit if the CSA waited until June 2 they absolutely fucked every stakeholder, including themselves most importantly, by doing that. 
 

Same with the attempted women’s strike at their cup. Absolutely classless and with no regard for the fans or themselves. Want to strike? Don’t accept the call. You don’t negotiate by going nuclear and flushing the money you’re fighting over down the drain … never mind your limited opportunities for prep. 

[Bigandy]

4 minutes ago, Ottawafan said:

https://www.sportingnews.com/ca/soccer/news/why-canada-soccer-game-vs-panama-cancelled-explaining-contract-dispute/zq0t1rdql3jfhjlwjgn4as2f

The men characterized the relationship with Canada Soccer as "strained for years". They claimed that the organization "disrespected our team and jeopardized our efforts to raise the standards and effectively advance the game in Canada" by delaying contract discussions and waiting "until the evening of June 2nd to present an archaic offer" after contract discussions had begun back in March.

And this is why they went on strike.  So no, not false.  

You are moving the goal post again. 

The topic was " The teams had to go on strike in order to get CSA to the negotiating table". Even your post proves that negotiations began in march and a proposal was set out in June. Thats roughly 2-3 months. A negotiation like this is very very volatile and should be given due consideration. 2-3 months is a reasonable timeline. This further proves the original point that going on strike was not to get the CSA to negotiate. They went on strike to get more prize money. 

The goal post you are now moving to is: - "Did the men believe they have a reason to go on strike". 
-The answer is: yes, of course they believed they had a reason or else they wouldnt go on strike. However, that is not the original goal post. 

What your post proves is that the men didn't like the proposal on June 2nd. The women thought it was a step in the right direction. The insight from this is that the CSA were being pushed and pulled in different directions from the mens and womens teams. Of course the negotiations will take longer when you have differing stances from 3 different parties.  
Both your post and mine, prove that the CSA were at the negotiating table before the mens strike and LONG before the womens strike.

[Sal333]

1 minute ago, Kent said:

Just a reminder, that if you believe the CSB deal is horrible and the 20 year term is way too long, if the deal stays in place for the duration, that will mean we have had 20 years of CPL soccer. The CSL only lasted 6 seasons.

Also, if the deal is hugely profitable for the CSB, it should be easy to sign on expansion teams and grow the league further.

Even if you think the deal is bad, you have to admit some amount of good can come out of it. 

Just because the deal with the CSA lasts 20 years it doesn't necessarily mean the CPL will last that long. They weren't able to keep the Edmonton club afloat, could just as easily happen to some, none, or all the other clubs. Some of the attendance numbers I saw, were pretty frightening and yes I know it's a start up league.

[Ottawafan]

Just now, Bigandy said:

You are moving the goal post again. 

The topic was " The teams had to go on strike in order to get CSA to the negotiating table". Even your post proves that negotiations began in march and a proposal was set out in June. Thats roughly 2-3 months. A negotiation like this is very very volatile and should be given due consideration. 2-3 months is a reasonable timeline. This further proves the original point that going on strike was not to get the CSA to negotiate. They went on strike to get more prize money. 

The goal post you are now moving to is: - "Did the men believe they have a reason to go on strike". 
-The answer is: yes, of course they believed they had a reason or else they wouldnt go on strike. However, that is not the original goal post. 

What your post proves is that the men didn't like the proposal on June 2nd. The women thought it was a step in the right direction. The insight from this is that the CSA were being pushed and pulled in different directions from the mens and womens teams. Of course the negotiations will take longer when you have differing stances from 3 different parties.  
Both your post and mine, prove that the CSA were at the negotiating table before the mens strike and LONG before the womens strike.

If you say so. 

[Kingston]

4 minutes ago, Kent said:

Just a reminder, that if you believe the CSB deal is horrible and the 20 year term is way too long, if the deal stays in place for the duration, that will mean we have had 20 years of CPL soccer. The CSL only lasted 6 seasons.

Also, if the deal is hugely profitable for the CSB, it should be easy to sign on expansion teams and grow the league further.

Even if you think the deal is bad, you have to admit some amount of good can come out of it. 

Question since I haven't followed all the ins and outs of the CSB:  Who gets the CSB money after the CSA has been paid its share?  I realize at least some of it helps the CPL.  But is that all the remaining money or just part of it?  And does it go to the CPL as a league or actually to the owners of the CPL teams or what?

[Kent]

6 minutes ago, Sal333 said:

Just because the deal with the CSA lasts 20 years it doesn't necessarily mean the CPL will last that long. They weren't able to keep the Edmonton club afloat, could just as easily happen to some, none, or all the other clubs. Some of the attendance numbers I saw, were pretty frightening and yes I know it's a start up league.

My point is that presumably if the league folds, so does the CSB and the deal is done, hence the deal wouldn't last the duration of the 20 year term.

So I'm saying, that if the worst thing about the deal is that it is 20 years old, either it won't last 20 years or we will have the CPL for at least 20 years.

[Bigandy]

Just now, Kingston said:

Question since I haven't followed all the ins and outs of the CSB:  Who gets the CSB money after the CSA has been paid its share?  I realize at least some of it helps the CPL.  But is that all the remaining money or just part of it?  And does it go to the CPL as a league or actually to the owners of the CPL teams or what?

The CSB is a private organization. 

The profits they make from the CSA deal can be used however they like, however its in the bank account of the company, not the owners personal accounts. Currently, no transfer of cash has gone from the CSB's account and into the owners/investors accounts. We can also logically deduce that a large amount of the profits are used to keep the CPL sustainable. We can also assume a bunch of the cash is reinvested into operational budgets to keep the marketing flowing. At any point the CSB could cut or add funds from the CSA deal to any part of their business or pay the owners. 

[Aird25]

11 minutes ago, Kingston said:

Question since I haven't followed all the ins and outs of the CSB:  Who gets the CSB money after the CSA has been paid its share?  I realize at least some of it helps the CPL.  But is that all the remaining money or just part of it?  And does it go to the CPL as a league or actually to the owners of the CPL teams or what?

According to CSB the money that hasn't gone to CSA has gone towards funding the other programs under the CSB umbrella (CPL, CanChamp, League 1s (men and women), coaching, referees, media etc.). It's also probably used to help broker the deals they enter into. They say the investors haven't taken any of it.

However, they could very well have been operating with a deficit from the deal until recently

Edited March 22, 2023 by Aird25

[Kent]

5 minutes ago, Kingston said:

Question since I haven't followed all the ins and outs of the CSB:  Who gets the CSB money after the CSA has been paid its share?  I realize at least some of it helps the CPL.  But is that all the remaining money or just part of it?  And does it go to the CPL as a league or actually to the owners of the CPL teams or what?

I don't honestly know the details. CSB owns the CPL and also L1O (I don't think it owns PLSQ, not sure about L1BC). I don't know exactly what CSB does with any profits (or if the deal has indeed made a profit overall), but it's clear that it's in place to help fund their league operations.

[Kingston]

Thanks to all three of you.

I guess where I'm going with this is to figure out if the money actually goes to the CPL or if, as it sounds, it's actually to the CSB investors.

Do we know who the CSB investors are?

It sounds like, although the CSB is meant to support soccer, it could just become money for the investors personally.

Also, I'm curious about the relationship between the CSB and the CPL.  If the individual CPL teams (or owners) all own the CSB, what happens to CPL expansion teams?

[narduch]

11 minutes ago, Kingston said:

Thanks to all three of you.

I guess where I'm going with this is to figure out if the money actually goes to the CPL or if, as it sounds, it's actually to the CSB investors.

Do we know who the CSB investors are?

It sounds like, although the CSB is meant to support soccer, it could just become money for the investors personally.

Also, I'm curious about the relationship between the CSB and the CPL.  If the individual CPL teams (or owners) all own the CSB, what happens to CPL expansion teams?

The CSB are claiming they aren't taking ant dividends out of it.

All the money goes back into their soccer endeavors 

[Big_M]

8.2M of total sponsorship money in 2022 which includes value of products and services offered. How much of that was cash? 1/2, 1/3, 1/4? And then how much of that cash was for leagues (CPL, L1BC, L1O, PLSQ)?

Meanwhile they are giving 3M+ of cash to CSA

As said CSB is losing money and will now have to decide what to do if they cannot become profitable on this deal:

-Renegotiate a deal where they will give less to CSA yearly and CSA will have more control

-Decide to not renew the deal in 2027 if they cannot get more than 4M of yearly sponsorship cash coming in

[Shway]

21 minutes ago, Kingston said:

Thanks to all three of you.

I guess where I'm going with this is to figure out if the money actually goes to the CPL or if, as it sounds, it's actually to the CSB investors.

What we know is that the CPL team salary is at least 1 million per club. That's 7M in player fees for all of its clubs.
Then theres the operational stuff like meals, rent, hotels, flights (WestJet subsidizes?), and staff. Let's say that's an extra 2M.

The CSB is the CPL. The board of directors of the CSB is owners of CPL clubs. 

I guess were going to have to get into the expenses of the CPL to finally see that the CSB isn't making money TODAY. 

[Kadenge]

1 hour ago, Big_M said:

 

As said CSB is losing money and will now have to decide what to do if they cannot become profitable on this deal:

CSB may be losing money overall, but where did you see/hear that CSB is losing money on the CSA/CSB deal?

[eramosat]

time for me to try and ignore this topic, once and for all. 

because nobody has learned anything, or come to any conclusions about what $$ was earned, or spent, rightfully or wrongfully.  there are no facts, just opinions of varying degrees. no different than most topics here, except the level of earnestness and righteousness is a bit heightened.  but mostly the dragging of all canada soccer efforts into the pure mud.

so, next time you see me post here, please remind me I was supposed to ignore all of this, and remain blissfully  and ignorantly happy with the state of our actual, on-field product.

[dyslexic nam]

3 minutes ago, eramosat said:

time for me to try and ignore this topic, once and for all. 

because nobody has learned anything, or come to any conclusions about what $$ was earned, or spent, rightfully or wrongfully.  there are no facts, just opinions of varying degrees. no different than most topics here, except the level of earnestness and righteousness is a bit heightened.  but mostly the dragging of all canada soccer efforts into the pure mud.

so, next time you see me post here, please remind me I was supposed to ignore all of this, and remain blissfully  and ignorantly happy with the state of our actual, on-field product.

See you tomorrow. 

[ted]

7 hours ago, Kingston said:

Do we know who the CSB investors are?

[snip]
Also, I'm curious about the relationship between the CSB and the CPL. 

The CSB is the CanPL owners, at least the original ones. I have never seen anything about whether expansion teams* were invited to join.

*only Ottawa at this point because VFC is owned by the same people as PFC so they are already part of CSB.

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

8 hours ago, Kadenge said:

CSB may be losing money overall, but where did you see/hear that CSB is losing money on the CSA/CSB deal?

A lot depends on what the $2.8 million number that is getting mentioned a lot actually represents. Is it before or after the CSA receive their payment? Suspect it's the latter once CSB's expenses over the year are taken care of but yet to see it explained definitively.

A number like that split eight ways wouldn't necessarily go very far towards covering a CanPL team's budget and this was during a year when the men's team made it to Qatar. They may well have been losing money on the deal prior to 2022.

The problem CSB/CanPL have is that the more the national team players kick up a fuss, the less likely they are to attract blue chip corporate sponsors and the more likely those corporations are to find ways to sponsor star players on the national teams directly and to support other avenues like Project 8.

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

14 hours ago, Kent said:

...Even if you think the deal is bad, you have to admit some amount of good can come out of it. 

If players receiving regular call ups on the fringes of the CMNT first team were playing in CanPL, there was a women's pro league up and running with at least some CWNT players playing in it, and each CanPL club was running a merit based youth academy that were playing a strong role where the youth national teams are concerned, the deal would be a lot easier to justify.

As things stand it is a complete fiasco because the reality of CanPL doesn't even come close to matching the vision that was being peddled by Victor Montagliani back around 2018. Hence why rightly or wrongly it gets referred to as a "minor league" by the CMNT roster and viewed as a drain on resources that the CMNT and CWNT rosters think should be heading in their direction instead.

Edited March 23, 2023 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[CanadaFan123]

Seeing posts like this really puts things into perspective. Things could be a lot worse if we had unambitious people like the parrot in charge. We really do need to give credit where credit is due. 

The success of CPL has been phenomenal and is a vision even I couldn’t have imagined. The league is growing every year in talent and support and has already achieved continental success. We have 2 of 8 teams going to champions league next year at minimum and now even the Canadian MLS teams are getting a fairer shake in their qualification path. 

Nothing the parrot speaks of would produce the above. We’d be watching MLS Next teams play League 1 level soccer to crowds of 200. This antiquated thinking is what kept us in the mud from the 90s to 2019. 
 

What parrot needs to realize is that the failure of MLS to assist Canadian soccer is what gave CPL the oxygen to live. If MLS made Canadians domestic and the Canadian clubs properly nurtured their talent there would be no CPL. Instead we’ve had garbage shoved down our throats with the rare sprinkling of Canadian talent. The birth of CPL has even given MLS clubs proper loan options for their youngsters at pro levels, which is already paying dividends for Montreal. 

Edited March 23, 2023 by CanadaFan123

[Aird25]

What was it Einstein said about insanity?

[El Hombre]

17 hours ago, Ottawafan said:

That’s possible. Or maybe the players have a much better understanding of the deal than we do. Hence their position. 

Sometimes when you have people that are very good in one respect (in this case, elite athletes) you will subconciously believe that they are similarly adept in other aspects of life (ie. budgets, financial management etc.).  The press releases from the players group and their interactions with the media clearly show that they do not understand as much as they think they do.  Alastair Johnston can whip in a great cross but there's no way I'd solicit his advice on my company's P&L.

Now, having said that, if management is smart and has accurately taken the temperature of their team and realizes that there is discontent, that is when you go on an education tour and you educate people about where the money is going and you open a dialog.  That clearly has been the CSA's biggest deficiency in all of this.  This deficiency could be due to something as simple as not having a real General Secretary to do this tour or something asnine like thinking that explaining how the books are balanced to the plebes (ie. the players) is beneath them, who knows.  But a lot of this could have been avoided with respectful dialog.

So, in my mind, you can choose to be on the players side or the CSA's side, but both sides have major issues that have contributed to this mess.  Neither is blameless.

[Ottawafan]

45 minutes ago, CanadaFan123 said:

Seeing posts like this really puts things into perspective. Things could be a lot worse if we had unambitious people like the parrot in charge. We really do need to give credit where credit is due. 

The success of CPL has been phenomenal and is a vision even I couldn’t have imagined. The league is growing every year in talent and support and has already achieved continental success. We have 2 of 8 teams going to champions league next year at minimum and now even the Canadian MLS teams are getting a fairer shake in their qualification path. 

Nothing the parrot speaks of would produce the above. We’d be watching MLS Next teams play League 1 level soccer to crowds of 200. This antiquated thinking is what kept us in the mud from the 90s to 2019. 
 

What parrot needs to realize is that the failure of MLS to assist Canadian soccer is what gave CPL the oxygen to live. If MLS made Canadians domestic and the Canadian clubs properly nurtured their talent there would be no CPL. Instead we’ve had garbage shoved down our throats with the rare sprinkling of Canadian talent. The birth of CPL has even given MLS clubs proper loan options for their youngsters at pro levels, which is already paying dividends for Montreal. 

We need the CPL and its teams to be successful.  Soccer in Canada needs them to be financially viable.  And eventually those clubs need to get to a point where they can start having youth developmental squads.  

[CanadaFan123]

4 minutes ago, Ottawafan said:

We need the CPL and its teams to be successful.  Soccer in Canada needs them to be financially viable.  And eventually those clubs need to get to a point where they can start having youth developmental squads.  

Let’s not forget that it took MLS 11 years to establish academies. Wanting academies this early is putting the cart before the horse. There’s no need right now - the goal is incremental growth for the clubs first team operations. Those clubs are doing just fine in identifying and bringing in their own talent for now. 

[dyslexic nam]

8 minutes ago, Ottawafan said:

We need the CPL and its teams to be successful.  Soccer in Canada needs them to be financially viable.  And eventually those clubs need to get to a point where they can start having youth developmental squads.  

I think this is 100% the vision of the league owners.  But they went into this venture eyes wide open recognizing that losing money in the first years of a league is pretty much inevitable.  Throw in the pandemic and it is pretty amazing that things are going as well as they are.   Not to say that there isn’t still a ton of work to do - there is.   But the league seems to be on the right path.