Soccer Pimp: In Defence of Passion

If you're a casual sports fan you may not be aware that the North American sports world is in the midst of a long-standing, ever-mutating battle between traditional "American" sports and soccer. This battle involves fans, owners and media, and it happens on both a conscious and sub-conscious level. The battle is the following; how to resist the growth of the world's most popular sports in its final holdout region, USA and Canada.

Despite a few blips, the Forces of Resistance have always had the upper hand on the Knights of Footy, thanks to an entrenched anti-soccer media. In the late 70's the NASL took North America by storm with the arrival of Pelé, who signed to play for the New York Cosmos. It was an explosion that couldn't be sustained. As soon as Pelé was gone the sport imploded for a multitude of reasons (I suggest watching Once In A Lifetime as an educational tool), sending it into a dark place where it remained for a few more decades. At the time, critics of the sport cited its un-American slant, and even went as far as to call it the sport of Communists (ah, the Cold War, how we miss you!).

When the US successfully bid on hosting the 1994 World Cup, FIFA forced a concession from the organizing committee; America would have to establish its own national soccer league. Major League Soccer was born, and this time the people put in charge did it the right way. They fostered a slow growth of the league, waiting until markets developed and genuine demand presented itself for expansion. The seed was planted. Now the naysayers claimed that a National league could never work, people didn't want the product shoved down their throats, the NASL proved that soccer could not sustain itself. Note the escalation in sophistication and volume of the arguments.

The success of the 1994 World Cup took many by surprise, and introduced many more to the beautiful game (including yours truly who was 18 at the time). Networks began to take note and began buying rights to broadcast matches from the best leagues in Europe. As more and more people grew interested in the game, resistance grew ever more feverish. The arguments of the time were that this was a sport for sissies, divers, immigrants, it was boring, there was no action. Media types began writing columns dismissing the sport, claiming to not "get" what the fuss was about, all a flash in the pan.

With more cable licences being awarded, and more and more sports channels becoming available, soccer continued to grow. Here in Canada, Sportsnet (first CTV, then Rogers) began pushing soccer in a major way, by signing an exclusivity contract with the Canadian Soccer Association to carry all national team games but more importantly, carrying several English Premiership matches every week. People around me, knowing I was a fan of the sport, started asking more and more pertinent questions about it: "How does it work?", "What is relegation?", "Why is Owen Hargreaves not playing for Canada?", etc. I even wrote a column on the Voyageurs website to give lovers of the sport a bit of ammunition against the multiplying howls of fury at the sport's growth.

Apparently the reporters being asked to cover soccer were not happy about it, and this translated to numerous sports personalities taking shots at the sport. I'll never forget the play-by-play voice of the Ottawa Senators, Dean Brown, on a CBC panel with the Ottawa Citizen's Wayne Scanlan debating the popularity of the sport and its potential in Canada. This was on the eve of the 2002 World Cup. Brown completely ripped soccer and the people who love it, such a vociferous, unwarranted attack that I will never forgive him for it. It was low-brow stuff, the typical macho, hockey-is-king bullshit. There was something about soccer that made these people's blood boil; even having to talk about it seemed like an insult to their manhood and fighting words would fly.

Seven years on, soccer's made some incredible strides. The signs are everywhere: Toronto FC selling out every home game they've ever played, Vancouver being awarded an MLS expansion franchise for 2011, Montreal and Ottawa practically begging for a franchise, 55,000+ at Olympic Stadium for a CONCACAF Champions League match, no less than three cable channels dedicated to soccer, UEFA Champions League matches every week on TSN, Premiership on Sportsnet and The Score. On Sunday night, I noticed something incredible during the broadcast of the Braves-Phillies MLB season kickoff; on the news crawler at the bottom of the screen, alongside fellow categories "MLB", "NBA", "NHL" and "NCAA" were "MLS" and "Soccer". When soccer's turn was up, scores from the English, Italian, Spanish and Mexican leagues flashed across the screen. I smiled. When the "Worldwide Leader" deems you worthy of real estate on its crawler, you've officially arrived.

And now we've come to the reason for this random defence of soccer, and more specifically its passionate fans. Over the last few weeks I've been reading and hearing many of the Forces of Resistance, in its death throes, argue that the fans of soccer who attend games are indeed poseurs, fakes, guilty of fabricated enthusiasm. When I hear this, I know the Knights of Footy have won. If your argument, your last stand against the invasion, is that the emotion and passion you witness is somehow "fake", it might be better to just sulk as you cry into your beverage. You've failed to get on board, you've erred in your assessment of the qualities of the sport, you are immune to the contagious quality of fan pro-activity. For what you deem "fabricated enthusiasm" is really proactive engagement from fans. Those passionate people you see on television supporting Toronto FC? They've met beforehand, they congregate on the internet, they invent chants, they create banners, they come to the stadium prepared to lift their team without the need for permission from jumbotron prompts. They have songs for individual players, individual occurrences, and they intimidate opposition players.

Soccer has arrived, and is here to stay. The media has finally evolved into embracing the sport. More and more news organizations, both online and traditional, have a soccer columnist on staff. Soccer highlights take up more and more time on sports news shows. The debate is no longer "can soccer catch on in Canada?", it is "how big will it get?". You think there's a lot of coverage now? Just wait until Canada's Mens National Team finally qualifies for the World Cup - only 5 years to Brazil 2014!

How long before the Forces of Resistance play their last card and start branding us all hooligans? Or has that already started?

Soccer Pimp: Hooray! (I think?)

And so the next frontier in Canadian soccer history has been breached: Vancouver will join MLS in 2011. They will join Toronto FC as the other Canadian entry in what is (in theory) an American soccer league (although with Montréal and Ottawa in the on deck circle, how far can we really be from a true North American league?).

Part of me is thrilled that Canada gets another top level professional soccer club to cheer on, but I can't help but feel that this was Montréal's time to get a franchise. The Impact have already built a soccer-specific stadium and fill it regularly for a team in a lower division than MLS. They recently filled Olympic Stadium with over 55,000 fans for a CONCACAF Champions League match (and would have done it again had the Impact not choked spectacularly down in Mexico!). They have strong ownership in the Saputo brand and are deeply involved in the community. Plus let's get real: Canadian or not, Vancouver is 5,000 kilometers away, making it cheaper for me to see a match in Columbus, or New York, or Boston.

It will potentially mean more MLS soccer on television and increased media coverage, and that's always a good thing. It will heighten the rivalry with Toronto FC, and make the Voyageurs Cup more competitive (now the Impact will have to defeat two MLS teams to represent Canada in the Champions League, not just one). It will pave the way to more Canadian teams joining the league. These are the positives. But I can't shake this feeling that Montreal got jobbed.

Montreal seemed well on it's way to be the next MLS team just a short year ago. It made the shortlist of potential expansion cities and all logic pointed to the awarding of a franchise in La Belle Province. So what happened?

The sequence of events is troubling. At first, all the right things on both sides were being said. "Great city, no brainer, foregone conclusion", etc, etc. Then at a press conference, MLS commissioner Don Garber announced that Montreal had withdrawn its expansion bid. This caught everyone by surprise, including Impact owner Joey Saputo, who denied anything of the sort! A few days went by and the right things were being said again: "Next round of expansion, tickets prices were an issue,"etc. The pricing thing made sense, since the Impact have prided themselves on low ticket prices that make the Impact an ideal family outing, and MLS have minimum ticket prices that could be difficult for Impact fans to stomach. That's fine. But was this the real reason, or was the veil being dropped over our eyes?

It's difficult to tell, but remember that George Gillett (pictured, right), owner of the Montreal Canadiens and Liverpool FC, has made it known he'd love an MLS franchise. It's not out of the realm of possibility that Don Garber is much less comfortable with a French-Italo-Canadian-cheese and Jos Louis maker than with a WASP Texas businessman with much deeper pockets that would immediately link his MLS club to the storied Liverpool FC.

If I'm right, and this is what truly happened, it would be quite unfair to the Saputo family. They have nurtured the soccer culture in Montreal from its embryonic stage to the solid franchise it is today. To have the rug swept from under them by a swaggering cowboy would be sad indeed.

But hey, today is day of celebration for Vancouver and its Whitecaps. Canadian soccer is a winner today. Let's keep this momentum going and hope Vancouver can be as wild about their soccer team as Toronto ended up being.

Soccer Pimp: Journey to Torreon

Last week I undertook a daring mid-week there and back again adventure to Montréal, in order to take in a historic moment in Canadian soccer history. The Impact were playing the first leg of a home-and-home quarterfinal match against Santos Laguna, the champions of last season's Mexican domestic league.

History was being made on the pitch, as Montréal was representing Canada's first entry in the CONCACAF Champions League, and doing so with aplomb. After securing the right to represent Canada by winning the Voyageurs Cup (a mini-tournament that took place over the length of the summer with Canada's other two notable professional teams, Vancouver Whitecaps and Toronto FC), they bowled over most of their opposition originating from clubs in Mexico, Guatemala and Trinidad & Tobago to reach the present quarterfinal stage.

History was also being made off the pitch with Olympic Stadium being reincarnated as a soccer mecca, attracting 55,571 of my closest friends. That ranked as the third highest attendance for a soccer match in the country, all-time.

Having arrived near the stadium in plenty of time before kickoff, we were nonetheless delayed from entering the venue due to a catastrophic lack of planning by organizers. It was no secret that the house was going to be rocking with a 50,000+ crowd, but organizers did nothing to facilitate the flow of humanity trying to get into the stadium. No police directing traffic at major intersections, no parking attendants to direct us to the nearest available parking. The end result is that we stood still in traffic for an hour, missing 30 minutes of the first half and the first goal 5 minutes in, and that only because our lovely companions urged us to hand over parking duties to them so we could go ahead. Our eternal thanks, ladies.

Despite the inconvenience and frustration of the arrival, all those feelings melted away as we found our section (and removing some fairly large Mexican supporters who were squatting in our seats - good thing my buddy Karl is so intimidating!). Being part of such a large crowd, a SOCCER crowd no less, tends to make you forget your worries other than the peaks and valleys of the action unfolding before you.

The match was already 1-0 to the Impact when we arrived, and within a few moments we could tell that the Impact had a fantastic game plan and were executing it to perfection. The skill level of the opposing team was superior, but Montréal's defend-and-counter strategy was too much for Santos Laguna to overcome. It almost seemed like the Mexican champions thought that by simply showing up the match was already won.

Adding a second half goal to make it 2-0, as well as having a keeper in Matt Jordan that dominated his area, was all the Impact needed to seal the first leg victory. The atmosphere was typical of a Montreal crowd: enthusiastic, passionate and in love with the big moment.

The return match is tonight in Torreon, Mexico in front of a hostile crowd and you can watch it at 10pm on CBC Bold or stream it at CBC.ca. Montréal will advance if the following happens:

• Impact wins
• Impact ties
• Impact loses by 1
• Impact loses by 2 but scores a goal

They've got one foot in the door already. Is it too early to dream of March 18th sold out semi-final match at the Big "O"?