A league of our own

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 26/04/2019 (2671 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

You know that moment, just before the start of the season, when it seems like anything is possible?

The coaches and managers have said all the right things, the players are healthy and raring to go, the stadium is dressed up and quietly waiting, and your team, yes, your team, could be about to do something special. Because, why not? Standings and stats have yet to provide separation and doubt. Right here, right now, you and every other fan of every other team are experiencing the same exhilarating moment.

Well, Canada, this is your moment. Our moment. And not only for the much-anticipated start of the 2019 Canadian Premier League season, but also for the long-awaited launch of the league itself. Our league.

A league that dips one boot in the Atlantic Ocean and another in the Pacific, that hobnobs with the metropolises of southern Ontario and expands into the fertile, big-sky Prairies. Ours. All ours.

“Yours.” “Mine.” “Ours.” Such possessive descriptors have always clutched at the teams we support and allegiances we swear by, and it’s never mattered to us whether that loyalty is attached to fully-independent clubs, for which it’s easy to feel a certain ownership, or franchises, in which we’ll never have material stake. We forget all that when the match kicks off, if we even think of it in the first place.

The fact of the matter is that, as consumers, we have the only stake that matters: us. Without us, there is no product. It’s a dizzying amount of power — all the power in the world, really — and power we so rarely wield. But we do when it comes to sports, and we certainly have when it comes to these most exciting of days in the history of soccer in this country.

Today, when Hamilton’s Forge FC hosts Toronto’s York 9 FC (12 p.m., CBC), we’ll experience the CPL’s debut match because we wanted it, because of us.

Naturally, there are the investors who have devoted significant financial interest to this fledgling project, and local ownership groups that have taken a chance on a pan-Canadian soccer startup. It doesn’t happen without them, either, but they don’t exist without us, without eager fans who have long anticipated attaching possessive descriptors to soccer teams in our cities and future fans who, a generation or two from now, just might grow the whole thing into an enterprise that will shake up the landscape of Canadian sports.

Many of those fans, and many fans now, won’t care about the studies that examined the viability of this league. Most won’t be bothered by where the investment is coming from or the social media material that, it must be said, has done such an excellent job in pumping up enthusiasm from coast to coast. They won’t encounter names like Mediapro or Canadian Soccer Business.

What they will care about, and do care about, is the affordability of taking their family to a match, of the game-day experience and the coverage on television and streaming services, of the performance of their local team and players and the exploits of CPL stars, of enjoying their team, the league and the sport with fellow fans. Of anticipating more moments like this, when it seems like anything is possible.

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But not exactly like this. No, this is a once-in-a-lifetime moment for soccer fans in this country.

“Yours, mine and ours.” Here we go, Canada!

Winnipeg’s Valour FC opens on the road against Pacific FC in Langford, B.C., May 1.

jerradpeters@gmail.com

Twitter: @JerradPeters