League 1 Atlantic

[dyslexic nam]

^^^ I think those sorts of solutions would be the best option.  Wouldn’t completely neglect NL in any developments, would provide them with pathways into the full Canadian footy superstructure, but wouldn’t hobble a regional effort that will already face some very real logistical challenges.  B

[Unnamed Trialist]

52 minutes ago, dyslexic nam said:

^^^ I think those sorts of solutions would be the best option.  Wouldn’t completely neglect NL in any developments, would provide them with pathways into the full Canadian footy superstructure, but wouldn’t hobble a regional effort that will already face some very real logistical challenges.  B

Not exactly the same, but like these summer series in Saskatchewan, trying to warm things up for a future team in CPL. If Alberta goes it on their own in League 1, then you'd have to think about similar solutions of tournaments, an invitational, to test the quality of the Manitoba USL team, and T-Bay Chill. 

We are realistic. The L1 model is best with higher density provinces to reduce travelling, since it is really amateur. But you still want to know what the level of a good club is in Regina or Saint John's.

[Kent]

For what it's worth, in this interview with Dino Rossi, he says that he says he hopes/expects L1C to be coast to coast in 2025. He later mentions specifically having L1's operating in all 10 provinces, which would obviously include Newfoundland. Doesn't mention them specifically, so no hints as to whether they would be part of the Atlantic league or it's own league. And no, I don't remember at what times he made those comments. I watched it an hour or 2 ago.

 

[Kingston]

We are basically never going to have coverage in Newfoundland outside of St. John's.  So worrying about bringing in Newfoundland is like worrying about whether we have coverage in Barrie, Ontario - it's not going to make or break things.  It would be nice but it's not worth risking an entire east coast D3 league by imposing huge travel costs on everyone else just so we can say we have teams in all ten provinces.

[dyslexic nam]

41 minutes ago, Kingston said:

We are basically never going to have coverage in Newfoundland outside of St. John's.  So worrying about bringing in Newfoundland is like worrying about whether we have coverage in Barrie, Ontario - it's not going to make or break things.  It would be nice but it's not worth risking an entire east coast D3 league by imposing huge travel costs on everyone else just so we can say we have teams in all ten provinces.

100% agree.  That is why I like the idea of some sort of play-in mechanism that would allow them to participate in some capacity.   

[Watchmen]

On 3/17/2023 at 2:58 PM, Unnamed Trialist said:

We are realistic. The L1 model is best with higher density provinces to reduce travelling, since it is really amateur. But you still want to know what the level of a good club is in Regina or Saint John's.

Not just that, but you want all regions of the country to feel included. I'm not saying you risk the health of another L1 league, but giving teams/regions a path to the Voyageurs Cup proper (even just via play-in games) is an important step. Give the people of St John's the *possibility* of a match vs TFC or the Whitecaps, even if the odds of it happening are long.

[Raven]

 

[Unnamed Trialist]

17 hours ago, Raven said:

 

Someone from UPEI, good to see.

[Raven]

Follow up to Tweet from League 1 Canada: PEI Soccer was in attendance and there will be a presentation to NFLD

 

[dyslexic nam]

The guy in the UPEI gear is Lewis Page. He is a former pro (I think he played in the English 2nd division maybe…?) and is now the coach of the UPEI teams - men’s and women’s I believe.  He was also the technical director of PEI Soccer association for 16 years and has coached women’s soccer with the CSA.

On the far right the guy in the maroon Holland College Hurricanes jacket is Jonathan Vos (Hurricanes head coach).  He too was the technical director of the PEISA for a while.

I don’t see the current executive of the PEISA but those two are major players in our provincial soccer scene and would have a direct line to the decision-makers on the Island.  

[Unnamed Trialist]

17 hours ago, dyslexic nam said:

The guy in the UPEI gear is Lewis Page. He is a former pro (I think he played in the English 2nd division maybe…?) and is now the coach of the UPEI teams - men’s and women’s I believe.  He was also the technical director of PEI Soccer association for 16 years and has coached women’s soccer with the CSA.

On the far right the guy in the maroon Holland College Hurricanes jacket is Jonathan Vos (Hurricanes head coach).  He too was the technical director of the PEISA for a while.

I don’t see the current executive of the PEISA but those two are major players in our provincial soccer scene and would have a direct line to the decision-makers on the Island.  

I asked this of the Newfoundlanders--what are the strongest clubs on the island, the ones who could, possibly, make a case for a L1 team?

How about their stadiums and facilities?

Also: since the model was introduced in BC to include university teams in a spring season, as a way of jump-starting L1 there, do you think that UPEI would be able to do that? Are UPEI players from PEI , or enough to justify being there after the school year is over?

 

[dyslexic nam]

16 minutes ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

I asked this of the Newfoundlanders--what are the strongest clubs on the island, the ones who could, possibly, make a case for a L1 team?

How about their stadiums and facilities?

Also: since the model was introduced in BC to include university teams in a spring season, as a way of jump-starting L1 there, do you think that UPEI would be able to do that? Are UPEI players from PEI , or enough to justify being there after the school year is over?

 

That’s tough to say.  I don’t know the players that well.  A bunch of them would either be locals or would stay on-Island over the summer while they are in the Uni years but not sure if that would make Spring participation viable.   Realistically though, if you could make it work logistically, it would be a great way of having your team get in a lot more training and development.   I would think any university teams doing this would gain a decent advantage over their peers.  

[Unnamed Trialist]

3 minutes ago, dyslexic nam said:

That’s tough to say.  I don’t know the players that well.  A bunch of them would either be locals or would stay on-Island over the summer while they are in the Uni years but not sure if that would make Spring participation viable.   Realistically though, if you could make it work logistically, it would be a great way of having your team get in a lot more training and development.   I would think any university teams doing this would gain a decent advantage over their peers.  

Last year's U-Sport champion did that, Thompson Rivers, playing the final against UBC, who also did it. So you could argue that indeed, it could create a more competitive U-Sports fall team (other factors would have been that TR was playing at home).

And the strongest clubs and best facilities on PEI?

[dyslexic nam]

22 minutes ago, Unnamed Trialist said:

Last year's U-Sport champion did that, Thompson Rivers, playing the final against UBC, who also did it. So you could argue that indeed, it could create a more competitive U-Sports fall team (other factors would have been that TR was playing at home).

And the strongest clubs and best facilities on PEI?

Facility would prob be the UPEI field.  It is turf, but soccer specific and centrally located (with obvious access to the Uni crowd).  I also think that if you were going to add any sort of decent seating capacity to an existing facility it would make the most sense to bolster the University’s infrastructure.   

In terms of teams, we usually consolidate the the best amateur players into a single provincial-level team to compete (historically) against the best teams in the NS or NB Premier leagues.  Known as PEI FC (or sometimes Churchill Arms FC after a local pub), they have even won the national amateur club championship (“Challenge Cup”) when we hosted back in 2010. I suspect we could pull together a team of the best provincial players. that could compete at the level contemplated.  
 

[Obinna]

On 3/17/2023 at 12:20 PM, Cblake said:

I agree, the D3 level would need a commercial aspect to it. Maybe have something like in Greenland. Maybe NFLD had a small 4 team league that played among themselves and then joined the rest of the Atlantic League in the post-season?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenlandic_Football_Championship

What you are describing already exists. It's the provincial challenge cup league. The current teams are Holy Cross, Fieldians AA, St Lawernce Laurentians, CBS Strikers, and Paradise SA. Teams from Mount Pearl and Corner Brook sometimes participate, but both have been off the circuit for a while, I think.  

Your suggestion is a good one. Perhaps have the winner continue going to the National Challenge Cup (in October) - but also have them go into the League 1 Atlantic playoff (early August based on L1BC). Problem is that "final weekend" in NL soccer is traditionally labour day weekend. You'd have to move up the league schedule by almost a month. 

Or League 1 Atlantic could go on the L1O schedule, which lines up perfectly. There'd be no problem in that case. 

The homer in me likes the idea of Holy Cross or Fieldians AA qualifying for 2 big tournaments instead of 1. Players from Newfoundland need all the high-level exposure they can get, so getting a buy into the League 1 Atlantic play-offs would be great for the province and would be great prep them for the National Challenge Cup trophy tournament. 

My question is what happens if they win the tournament? These teams are pay-to-play. There'd have to be some financial support if this were to occur.

[Obinna]

On 3/18/2023 at 12:48 PM, Kingston said:

We are basically never going to have coverage in Newfoundland outside of St. John's.  So worrying about bringing in Newfoundland is like worrying about whether we have coverage in Barrie, Ontario - it's not going to make or break things.  It would be nice but it's not worth risking an entire east coast D3 league by imposing huge travel costs on everyone else just so we can say we have teams in all ten provinces.

When it comes to League 1 talk, excluding Newfoundland from the Maritimes reminds me of excluding Sask/Manitoba from Alberta - something which was discussed in the League 1 Prairie thread. 

The players by-and-large come from the metropolitan regions, so I have considered them below and not the rural areas.

I have excluded areas like Brandon, Medicine Hat, Bathurst, etc. - just because I don't think they'll factor into this equation much.  

Metro Prairie Canada

Calgary - 1.5M

Edmonton - 1.5M

Lethbridge - 125k

Red deer - 100k

Total 3.225M

Winnipeg - 850k

Regina - 275k

Saskatoon - 350k

Total 1.275M (40% of Prairie Canada)

Metro Atlantic Canada

Halifax - 475k

Cape Breton - 100k

Moncton - 175k

Saint John - 125k

Fredericton - 100k

PEI - 125k

Total 1.1M

St. John's - 215k

Total 215k (20% of Atlantic Canada)

..................................................................................................

So, in summary, I think excluding Newfoundland is literally only half as bad as excluding Saskatchewan and Manitoba from the League 1 Canada pyramid. Clearly though it's more impactful than excluding Barrie from the League 1 system. I won't do the math for that, but Barrie accounts for a much, much smaller fraction of the Ontario pie.  

Edited April 4, 2023 by Obinna

[Obinna]

On 4/3/2023 at 10:18 AM, dyslexic nam said:

Known as PEI FC (or sometimes Churchill Arms FC after a local pub), they have even won the national amateur club championship (“Challenge Cup”) when we hosted back in 2010. I suspect we could pull together a team of the best provincial players. that could compete at the level contemplated.  
 

This may have to be the model for Newfoundland as well, even if we are just talking about a "bye to the post-season" concept. Like PEI, the scene is small, and the players all know each other for the most part, so team chemistry and such wouldn't be much of a factor. 

[Obinna]

35 minutes ago, Obinna said:

My question is what happens if they win the tournament? These teams are pay-to-play. There'd have to be some financial support if this were to occur.

Another thought - you'd have to basically do the post season in 1 weekend to accommodate a newfoundland team, be it a club like Holy Cross or an All-Star selection. You cannot do the Semifinal one weekend, then the final the next weekend, which is what I think BC did. I think you have to do the 2nd life system where:

1 plays 2 - winner goes to final, loser gets 2nd life, goes to semi.

3 plays 4 (newfoundland) - winner goes to semi, loser is eliminated

We've done this for years in Newfoundland over the labour day weekend, works fine. 

Getting ahead of myself here, but maybe the Maritime teams who don't make the post season would feel a certain way about a newfoundland bye? Assuming a 6 team League 1 Atlantic, you could do:

First place goes to post-season ranked 1

Second place goes to post-season ranked 2

3rd to 6th play their own qualifier the weekend before, the team coming out is 3rd for the post-season.  

[Obinna]

On 4/2/2023 at 3:57 PM, dyslexic nam said:

The guy in the UPEI gear is Lewis Page.

Legend of PEI soccer. Even as far away as Newfoundland you'd hear his name getting thrown around, mostly by coaches who've worked with him or played with/against him at some point. 

[dyslexic nam]

18 minutes ago, Obinna said:

Legend of PEI soccer. Even as far away as Newfoundland you'd hear his name getting thrown around, mostly by coaches who've worked with him or played with/against him at some point. 

Yeah, he is definitely a very prominent figure in our soccer community.  

[Cblake]

4 hours ago, Obinna said:

What you are describing already exists. It's the provincial challenge cup league. The current teams are Holy Cross, Fieldians AA, St Lawernce Laurentians, CBS Strikers, and Paradise SA. Teams from Mount Pearl and Corner Brook sometimes participate, but both have been off the circuit for a while, I think.  

Your suggestion is a good one. Perhaps have the winner continue going to the National Challenge Cup (in October) - but also have them go into the League 1 Atlantic playoff (early August based on L1BC). Problem is that "final weekend" in NL soccer is traditionally labour day weekend. You'd have to move up the league schedule by almost a month. 

Or League 1 Atlantic could go on the L1O schedule, which lines up perfectly. There'd be no problem in that case. 

The homer in me likes the idea of Holy Cross or Fieldians AA qualifying for 2 big tournaments instead of 1. Players from Newfoundland need all the high-level exposure they can get, so getting a buy into the League 1 Atlantic play-offs would be great for the province and would be great prep them for the National Challenge Cup trophy tournament. 

My question is what happens if they win the tournament? These teams are pay-to-play. There'd have to be some financial support if this were to occur.

I guess the question, is D3 going to be all that different that say the existing senior level soccer we have across the country. If L1 Alberta is essentially a rebranded AMSL and the CSA is ok with that, then that may make is easier to do things coast to coast. I get that some people post university want to play at a high level and do not want to travel/have a huge time commitment. That came up when it was being talked about how say L1BC would be different than the existing leagues like the VMSL. The level across the country had real potential to be uneven 

I also think it could be viewed as being unfair if you have some sort of small New Foundland competition that plays into the L1 Atlantic playoffs would that be acceptable. I do wonder?

[Obinna]

9 minutes ago, Cblake said:

I guess the question, is D3 going to be all that different that say the existing senior level soccer we have across the country. If L1 Alberta is essentially a rebranded AMSL and the CSA is ok with that, then that may make is easier to do things coast to coast. I get that some people post university want to play at a high level and do not want to travel/have a huge time commitment. That came up when it was being talked about how say L1BC would be different than the existing leagues like the VMSL. The level across the country had real potential to be uneven 

I also think it could be viewed as being unfair if you have some sort of small New Foundland competition that plays into the L1 Atlantic playoffs would that be acceptable. I do wonder?

I would guess that the top teams in the top senior leagues around Canada would be equivalent to a "typical" L1 team.

If you want to compare for yourself, I suggest going to the CSA youtube channel and watching a few minutes of National Challenge Cup games - they were recorded and uploaded and can be found in the playlist section, I believe. Then, go find some L1O games on youtube and watch a few minutes of them, see if you can spot a difference in the level of play. 

As for Newfoundland's Challenge Cup league winner feeding into L1 Atlantic playoffs, I see no problem. As I mentioned earlier, this tends to be either Holy Cross or Fieldians and both have held their own at Nationals when they've got there. I don't see L1 Atlantic teams blowing either out in a one-off game.

Personally, I would be interested to see how they do! Would really add the discussion of how much of a jump L1 is from what currently exists. 

Edit: Where you'd see a problem would be the bottom teams in the Newfoundland Challenge Cup playing L1 Atlantic teams. There would definitely be blow-out potential there. But hey, if those teams manage to do the unthinkable and become Newfoundland Champions, they've earned the right to test themselves in the L1 Atlantic playoffs at that point.

That's kind of what this whole thing is about - setting up a structure where players can reach for something greater. 

Edited April 4, 2023 by Obinna

[Obinna]

@Cblake here is Holy Cross (yellow) against the Nova Scotia champions (Dunbrack?) 

 

Here is a random L1O game:

@dyslexic nam by the way you asked in another thread how to time stamp youtube videos. Go here

[Kingston]

13 hours ago, Cblake said:

I guess the question, is D3 going to be all that different that say the existing senior level soccer we have across the country.

In year one, no.

In year ten, very much so.

Look at L1O.  It started with a bunch of existing clubs moving their teams into the new league.  So basically just a name change except the geographic range covered Windsor to Kingston instead of teams playing more locally.  Now the overall level has risen and the top teams are about to embark on a new phase to really start to elevate the game.

I expect we'll see something similar happen in other parts of the country over time.

 

 

[Unnamed Trialist]

44 minutes ago, Kingston said:

In year one, no.

In year ten, very much so.

Look at L1O.  It started with a bunch of existing clubs moving their teams into the new league.  So basically just a name change except the geographic range covered Windsor to Kingston instead of teams playing more locally.  Now the overall level has risen and the top teams are about to embark on a new phase to really start to elevate the game.

I expect we'll see something similar happen in other parts of the country over time.

I agree, it will all flesh out.

One key factor will clearly be how long you are playing competitively a year. IMO you should be competing for at least 9 months to advance, but since in Canada it's only possible on the West Coast, there are a lot of part-time players who simply do not play enough competitive matches in a year.

Now, we get to see three tiers of Canadian soccer in the Voyageurs Cup, and the scaling is clear. No one tier is going to blow out the next, but the separation is clear, level by level. The better L1s are also going to show better as the model expands.

In BC (there are other guys who have done this far more than me) I have been back in summers and watched Caps, Caps II, CPL, L1, then maybe even PCSL.  Almost always will do so over a few summers at least. In Spain I have had years where I've watched matches from 7-9 tiers, from Camp Nou down to my neighbourhood team in  8th tier, plus youth and women in a single season.

Every tier has differences you can see. In L1BC last year, in the final, UBC being a U-Sports team had kids with talent who played with the their heads down, tried to hot-dog like they did at high school, missed the right passes. Then other guys were less ostentatious and far more efficient on the field. Some were developed physically, others were sharp passers, others had gaps. I've watched PCSL and you'll often get a former pro or semi pro who is ageing but still has stuff, then some kid who's a bright light and will move up quickly, alongside clear amateurs. CPL is a higher level, the overall squad quality is far higher, and then CPL teams have very mixed rosters so you get a lot of different backgrounds and football cultures, so the play is richer and more varied. 

The guys in Newfoundland make a good point about teams from smaller provinces often competing well in the Challenge Cup, even winning. You can't just automatically say NFLD or PEI have nothing to say against an Ontario champ, if you watch them compete you realise they are not far off some years. But this is the same in other countries.