CPL General

[Ansem]

With Forge being 34 pts away from TFC, Forge will overtake TFC and Vancouver pretty soon. Winning the league must gets you extra points and if Forge wins again, it will be done.

[Ansem]

Footy Prime interviews CPL Commissioner Mark Noonan

Starts at 37:15

 

 

[JamboAl]

Interest article comparing Ottawa’s three minor pro teams: Atletico, Titans (Independent league baseball) and Blackjacks (CEBL).  Seems like the average attendance for Atletico is quite a bit below what the club has expected especially coming off a successful season.

https://ottawacitizen.com/sports/the-search-for-fans-ottawas-minor-pro-squads-look-to-fill-more-seats

[Bison44]

See in Parrot speak, this means Ottawa are on the verge of closing up shop.  

[Watchmen]

12 hours ago, Bison44 said:

See in Parrot speak, this means Ottawa are on the verge of closing up shop.  

Reading the article, it doesn't sound like that's the case.  But the word "frustrating" comes up a lot, and when Lopez mentions attendance of "10-15k" I hope that's not what Atletico Madrid was basing the financial case on.

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

They haven't quite reached the ultimatum on required crowd levels stage yet:

“We’re going to get there,” Lopez said. “It’s just a process...

but anyone who isn't a delusional space cadet where the league's current fiscal health is concerned should be more than a little alarmed by the tone of the CanPL content in that article and the way that the Atletico Madrid guy is not waxing lyrical about the 15k crowd for last year's playoff final and 7k being at the home opener angle when provided with some column inches by the Ottawa Citizen. Check out the number of blue dots on the Ticketmaster website for future Atletico games for why management may be less than gruntled about the response to being top of the league standings last season (i.e. the real champions from a European perspective).

Beyond that is it only the CMNT that get criticized bitterly for describing CanPL as "minor pro" as the headline does?

 

[jonovision]

Gate needs to be improved, but relying heavily on gate revenue will be a death knell for the league. CanPL attendances are often much better than teams in much better leagues in Europe (for example, the bottom 10 teams in the Portuguese top flight have worse average attendance than CPL).

Other revenue streams need to be developed. Or we can abandon ship and leave ourselves with a patchwork of regional bus leagues, and a situation where any player with any sort of ambition needs to leave the country. 

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

6 minutes ago, jonovision said:

....the bottom 10 teams in the Portuguese top flight have worse average attendance than CPL)...

Sure, but they can bus it on the day of the game to most away games (yes I know, Azores and Madeira) and get a slice of a TV deal involving Benfica, Sporting and Porto. It's easy to say revenue streams need to be developed but things are not likely to get much better than having the Mediapro deal and being able to siphon off CMNT and CWNT sponsorship revenues. If the numbers are not crunching properly even with those in place then cloth needs to be cut accordingly or the alternative is likely to ultimately be no league.

[Ansem]

13 minutes ago, jonovision said:

Gate needs to be improved, but relying heavily on gate revenue will be a death knell for the league. CanPL attendances are often much better than teams in much better leagues in Europe (for example, the bottom 10 teams in the Portuguese top flight have worse average attendance than CPL).

Other revenue streams need to be developed. Or we can abandon ship and leave ourselves with a patchwork of regional bus leagues, and a situation where any player with any sort of ambition needs to leave the country. 

Also, being blackout from the major sport channels show and cable as a whole is the massive elephant in the room. This definately affects the league and you could hear it in Noonan voice on footy prime.

Most Canadians are completely unaware of the league's existence. Hoping this CRTC case gets a resolution soon

It's comical when you see Fox tweet CPL highlights while TSN and Sportsnet acts like the league doesn't exist

Edited May 21, 2023 by Ansem

[jonovision]

2 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Sure, but they can bus it on the day of the game to most away games (yes I know, Azores and Madeira) and get a slice of a TV deal involving Benfica, Sporting and Porto. It's easy to say revenue streams need to be developed but things are not likely to get much better than having the Mediapro deal and being able to siphon off CMNT and CWNT sponsorship revenues. If the numbers are not crunching properly even with those in place then cloth needs to be cut accordingly or the alternative is likely to ultimately be no league.

Norway, then, Finland. Sweden. All of these leagues will include a good deal of air travel.

Local corporate sponsorship is the missing link, all but inevitable with a brand new league.

Edited May 21, 2023 by jonovision

[SoccMan]

The aim in attendance for now should be to try and get to an average of  just over 5000 for now  . Halifax is doing great with their attendance numbers and the fact they play in an appropriate stadium in terms of size makes it a place to be , when people get there and see a jammed packed stadium. This league can survive with attendances in the 5000 range for now and it’s a number from which to grow from eventually. However, you need a core of at least 6 teams that can stick around and continue to grow. I do think there are cities in this country where the CPL can expand into and if marketed right you can have a few more Halifax success stories in the stands . However, I think York can eventually work but it will take very dedicated owners and a better soccer friendly stadium , maybe Woodbine if built right, but that’s it for the Toronto area no more expansion one team is all I can see eventually working hopefully. Moreover, Vancouver for me has enough teams work with this new Vancouver team and let it grow it doesn’t need another team within the Metro Vancouver area at the CPL level to compete with for now . 

Edited May 22, 2023 by SoccMan

[Ansem]

Another benefit of having a Quebec City club would be that the league could have an opportunity to have that club's games being picked up by TVA Sports. The channel lost all the MLS rights to RDS and TVA is owned by Quebecor who also owns the cable company Videotron.

Massive opportunity to make gains on the Quebec market

[Cicero]

4 hours ago, jonovision said:

Norway, then, Finland. Sweden. All of these leagues will include a good deal of air travel.

Local corporate sponsorship is the missing link, all but inevitable with a brand new league.

In Sweden and Finland, the longest drives are about 7 hours, so it wouldn't be necessary, and most of the teams are within 3 hours of each other. Norway has a couple teams that would require flights (Bodo, Tromso), but the rest of the teams are 8 hours or less. I would guess they bus to most of their games in all of these leagues, but I don't actually know. Another significant cost is having to put thirty or forty people in a hotel for any length of time. If a flight avoids that, it may actually be cheaper in some cases to just get on a plane and go home.

Edited May 22, 2023 by Cicero

[ted]

On 5/14/2023 at 1:31 PM, jonovision said:

I was at my parents' and in the rare circumstance of holding a physical copy of the Winnipeg Free Press. On the page with all the baseball box scores, they also had the CPL table, though all teams were listed by city name instead of proper name. Has anyone noticed this elsewhere?

Haven't read a newspaper in years but I would prefer this approach in all media. I have been saying for literally decades that promoting a national league should include this sort of approach that emphasizes Canadian cities. People care far more about Victoria v Halifax than they do about Pacific v Wanderers.

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

7 hours ago, Cicero said:

In Sweden and Finland, the longest drives are about 7 hours, so it wouldn't be necessary, and most of the teams are within 3 hours of each other. Norway has a couple teams that would require flights (Bodo, Tromso), but the rest of the teams are 8 hours or less...

...and in European countries when air travel can be largely eliminated generally an average crowd of 2000 or so can sustain the bare minimum fully pro sort of setup. Also helps that they can often play more games than is the case in Canada because of less severe winters.

There is no huge mystery to any of this. A domestic pro soccer league would have happened a long time ago if we had a similar geography to Belgium. Toronto's National Soccer League could have done the job basically from the mid-1920s onwards under different geographical circumstances.

Winding things back to Atletico Madrid would a club like that even want to put their branding on something if the goal wasn't to be drawing 10,000+ on a reasonable timeline? Think people tend to forget sometimes what the scale of the ambitions of Victor Montagliani & Co originally were when a solo hosting bid for 2026 was the goal.

[Aird25]

11 hours ago, SoccMan said:

The aim in attendance for now should be to try and get to an average of over 50000

50,000 might be a bit ambitious at this point

[Aird25]

11 minutes ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

There is no huge mystery to any of this. A domestic pro soccer league would have happened a long time ago if we had a similar geography to Belgium. Toronto's National Soccer League could have done the job basically from the mid-1920s onwards under different geographical circumstances.

I know I’ve mentioned this to you before, but a regional Ontario league, or any regional league, is likely to draw far smaller crowds, and we’ve seen evidence of that time and time again. I find it ridiculous to even claim being a National soccer League if it’s only based in a small part of the country 

[SoccMan]

21 minutes ago, Aird25 said:

50,000 might be a bit ambitious at this point

Sorry I meant 5000 lol , not many leagues around the world have 50,000 as an average . 

[K Edgar]

[jonovision]

From the matches I've seen, the table is starting to more closely resemble my internal impressions of which teams are best. Certainly the top 3, in that order. 

[Tigers]

23 hours ago, Ansem said:

Another benefit of having a Quebec City club would be that the league could have an opportunity to have that club's games being picked up by TVA Sports. The channel lost all the MLS rights to RDS and TVA is owned by Quebecor who also owns the cable company Videotron.

Massive opportunity to make gains on the Quebec market

The billionaire who owns Quebecor also just bought the Alouettes. Could be the makings of a of a sports/TV symbiotic relationship like Bell/Rogers in Toronto. 

[Unnamed Trialist]

15 hours ago, Ozzie_the_parrot said:

Atletico Madrid would a club like that even want to put their branding on something if the goal wasn't to be drawing 10,000+ on a reasonable timeline? Think people tend to forget sometimes what the scale of the ambitions of Victor Montagliani & Co originally were when a solo hosting bid for 2026 was the goal.

Pretending to be an expert on what Atlético de Madrid wants, there is no end to the bad faith. Just make up a bunch of arbitrary bs and spew it out. And make it as wrong as possible. 

For example, Atlético de Madrid clearly, from day one, said they were interested in a woman's team as well. Meaning they are willing to go into the hole to strengthen their brand in Canada, because we all know a women's team in a women's league is an even harder sell. They did exactly this in Spain too, going into women's football at a loss.

The motives for ATM in Canada were never expressed in terms of minimum gate, that is just made up. They are a major world club that does not get full value from their shirt and merchandising because of a relative lack of brand recognition and allegiance to it. The main reason they have a team in Mexico and another in Canada, or previously were in India. They have done preseason tours in South America. The investment they make in the CPL--apart from being a pittance for them-- is all part of raising their international presence.

You are going to argue that a team is worried about nickel and dime gate then takes 30 plus people to a mountain resort north of Madrid for a month each year?

Then to pretend a team of that scale is worried about generating revenue from ticket sales, when they perfectly understand how gate has become increasingly less important in world football. 

Then OZZIE just forgets that Atlético de Madrid makes its way into Canada because One Soccer is set up as an arm of MediaPro, and Cerezo at AtM and Roures at MediaPro are very closely allied, they are both movie and tv content producers and work together. They are both in favour of the women's game too.

To think that any serious investor into CPL, and especially outside investors in a growing market, is not thinking at least until 2026, creating this hyper urgent soap opera drama scenarios constantly, shows no understanding at all.

Edited May 23, 2023 by Unnamed Trialist

[Ansem]

5 hours ago, Tigers said:

The billionaire who owns Quebecor also just bought the Alouettes. Could be the makings of a of a sports/TV symbiotic relationship like Bell/Rogers in Toronto. 

Peladeau hates Bell

[Ozzie_the_parrot]

On 5/22/2023 at 12:20 PM, SoccMan said:

Sorry I meant 5000 lol , not many leagues around the world have 50,000 as an average . 

My understanding is that the curtailed season length and extra expenses of running a coast-to-coast league with lots of air travel across a continent sized area mean that 5000 or so paid is needed in a North American context just to be able to do a bare bones level of full-time professionalism in a financially sustainable manner.

Newpaper stories related to the Ottawa Fury and FC Edmonton in an NASL context used to talk in terms of 8000 being more where they really wanted/needed to be in order to do things like bringing in reasonably high profile signings from overseas. I'd be surprised if Atletico Madrid's perspective on where things really need to be differs hugely from the Fury's given there is still some level of involvement by one of the former OSEG co-owners.

There are reasons why the lower budget pro leagues that hang around (e.g. minor league baseball, ECHL in the United States or junior hockey in Canada) tend to have a focus on long distance bus travel in regional conferences.  Soccer though often wants to emulate national league structures from Europe that emerged (with the obvious exception of Russia) out of a very different type of geography.

Edited May 23, 2023 by Ozzie_the_parrot

[jonovision]

I wonder how much money a person who had bet $100 on each match of the season to date to end in a draw would have made by now.