Things look up for Canadian soccer, or do they? With the debut of Toronto FC, the opening of its BMO Field and strong interest in the USL teams in Montreal and Vancouver, the pro game is doing surprisingly well. It’s at the national team level where there are problems.
Canada is ranked 94th place in the world, tucked between Libya and Ethiopia, in the FIFA rankings. The Canadian Soccer Association hasn’t been able to find a permanent replacement since Frank Yallop left as national team coach to return to MLS with Los Angeles last June. Brazilian Rene Simoes, who led Jamaica’s Reggae Boyz to the 1998 World Cup finals, was offered the job by CSA president Colin Linford, but the hiring was vetoed by the CSA board.
The problems haven’t gone unnoticed with players. Owen Hargreaves plays for England instead of the country of his birth in part because of his early (bad) experience with the Canadian soccer bureaucracy. Feyenoord midfielder Jonathan de Guzman from Toronto may cast his international lot with the Netherlands rather than Canada for which he’d be eligible to play at the U-20 World Cup Canada hosts this summer and for which older brother Julian plays at the senior level.