A Mexican soccer team featuring World Cup champion, five-time Champions League winner and former Real Madrid captain Sergio Ramos is no problem for the Vancouver Whitecaps.
On March 12, the Whitecaps surprised North American soccer by eliminating that Mexican team, Monterrey on away goals.
This is one of the few examples of how soccer in Canada has had a silent but exponential growth in the past decades.
The Canadian women’s national team has always been more competitive on the world stage, being 13th, the lowest rank the team has been in the last 20 years, on the FIFA rankings.
Canada’s women’s soccer national team won a gold medal at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
Oddly enough, Canada won’t have a professional women’s league until next month, when the Northern Super League (NSL) will kick-off, featuring six teams from Calgary, Halifax, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Vancouver.
On the other side, in the 2022 Confederation of North, Central America and Caribbean Association Football (Concacaf) men’s World Cup Qualifiers, Canada finished first over Mexico and the United States, the two countries that have ruled and won all of the region’s competitions.
Although Canada did not score any points in the 2022 World Cup, the young team showed resilience and put Canada’s name on the world stage for the first time since 1986.
In the following major international tournament, the 2024 Copa America, the team led by American Coach Jesse March was the surprise again, finishing fourth after losing in penalties against the always-protagonist Uruguay.
Now, Canada has its eye on the upcoming 2026 men’s FIFA World Cup, where the country will be the co-host along with Mexico and the U.S.
The question is: if Canada has been so successful lately, why has it failed to take a bigger step on the world stage competitively?
Gaining ground in Canada’s sports landscape
One might assume that it is because soccer is not a relevant sport in the country and there are bigger priorities with hockey. This is a fair but an incorrect assumption.
In a 2020 survey, 40 per cent of Canadians still considered hockey their favourite sport, while soccer ranked fourth. However, soccer’s rapid growth is significant and deserves attention.
As of the latest data, there are nearly one million registered active soccer participants in Canada, making it the largest participatory sport in the country compared to the 549,000 registered ice hockey players in Canada, according to the International Ice Hockey Federation.
One of the reasons behind this — and the most important, in my opinion — is the growing focus on developing young talent through youth academies and grassroots programs. This is a commitment that was made in the Canada Soccer 2022-2026 strategic plan.
Now, soccer has become the most popular sport among Canadian kids post-pandemic.
Canada’s professional-level growth has also helped the sport’s overall expansion. The Canadian Soccer League (CSL) paved the way for the Canadian Premier League (CPL), the addition of Canadian teams in Major League Soccer and the introduction of the NSL, Canada’s first professional women’s soccer league.
However, Canada’s soccer problem relies more on the organizational side rather than its popularity.
Canada Soccer’s dark side
During the 2024 Paris Olympics, Canada’s women’s national team used a drone to spy on a training session of New Zealand days before they were set to play each other.
As a result, six points were taken from the team, three members of the coaching staff, including now former Head Coach Bev Priestman, were suspended and later fired and an independent investigation was conducted.
The results of this investigation left more doubts than answers, experts said.
Canada Soccer’s financial troubles have overshadowed its on-field success, with a controversial deal with Canadian Soccer Business (CSB) at the center of criticism.
The agreement, which gives CSB full control over sponsorship and broadcast revenues while Canada Soccer receives a fixed annual sum, has been called “negligence and breach of fiduciary duty” by the Canadian women’s team in a $40-million lawsuit.
Former players and board members have condemned the lack of transparency.
“Where exactly does the money go? We don’t know,” said financial crime expert Claude Mathieu, calling Canada Soccer’s structure “very opaque.”
A parliamentary investigation found that the federation even attempted to destroy copies of its contract with CSB.
“I have never seen anything like it,” said Liberal MP and one of the elected officials on the parliamentary committee, Anthony Housefather, questioning why the deal was not properly approved by the board.
With Canada co-hosting the 2026 FIFA World Cup, the spotlight on Canada Soccer’s finances is intensifying.
The government has launched an audit, but for now, the same question remains: “Where is the money?”
