TORONTO — Women's soccer is booming around the world, and in Canada, it's no different. A crowd of 19,610 cheered on as Canada defeated Mexico 3-0 at BMO Field last week, and the Canadian team is a big draw across the country — both in live attendance and television ratings.
Yet despite the growth of the game, only two players on the roster for Saturday's win — high-schoolers Jayde Riviere and Jade Rose — actually ply their trade in Canada. The rest play abroad, either in NCAA programs or in professional leagues around the world.
It's a strange situation for the Canadians, who have worked their way up to the world No. 5 ranking despite never having a women's pro circuit within the country. For Canada coach Kenneth Heiner-Møller, who hails from Denmark, the lack of professional options for his players is unheard of.
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"I've got colleagues in Denmark who ask me 'what is the women's league like?' And I say we don't have any," Heiner-Møller said after Saturday's victory. "I think being at this level of the women's game without a league is pretty impressive, but maybe to move to the next level we need to look into what is actually doable."
While the lack of pro clubs is a problem for the Canadian women's program, it's also something the men's team has struggled with as well. With several failed leagues and clubs littering the men's professional game over the past few decades, Canada ended 2018 with just four fully pro teams: MLS trio Toronto FC, Vancouver Whitecaps and Montreal Impact, and USL club Ottawa Fury.
Last month, seven more clubs entered the landscape with the launch of the Canadian Premier League, creating over 140 new pro opportunities for Canadian men. Heiner-Møller hopes that a women's version of the CPL can emerge in time, although he acknowledges that there are signficant obstacles that need to be overcome.
"In Denmark, we always talk like it's a bad thing we are a small country, but in some cases, it's a great thing because you can go on a bus and you go four hours and you're on the other side of the country. You can't do that here," Heiner-Møller said. "So there's some things that need to be solved but it's good to see the men's CPL going and hopefully, in not so many years, it's going to happen to the women's [side] as well."
Christine Sinclair, Canada's captain and all-time leading scorer, had to leave her home nation in order to play professionally. The 35-year-old had stops at clubs in Southern California and Western New York before joining her current team, the Portland Thorns, in 2013.
Her journey throughout the U.S.-based system, from the NCAA to her time at various pro clubs, is a familiar one for much of the Canadian roster and it's something that Sinclair feels needs to change for Canada to truly become a world power in the sport.
"I think we're maybe the only country in the top 10 or 12 in terms of FIFA rankings that doesn't have a professional league, and the fact that we're able to consistently perform on the world stage is a testament to the players we have and the sacrifices they're willing to make to go find a professional environment," Sinclair said. "Like Kenneth said, I think [forming a Canadian professional league] has to be the next step in order to sustain where we're at and actually improve."