To put the CPSL in perspective, it’s Second Division pro soccer sitting just under the four A-League First Division teams that are part of a mostly U.S. north-south alignment, similar to that adopted more than half a century ago by the National Hockey League and subsequently, mainstream pro baseball and basketball. Below pro soccer is a massive amateur system in Canada, some 800,000 players, most of whom are youth and youngsters representing the country’s most played team sport.

Ursini believes the key to Canada’s position on soccer’s world stage is in its professional game. He’s not alone—Holger Osieck, Canada’s National team coach has made it clear that if Canada’s national team is to make progress, pro soccer must get its act together to accommodate the increasing numbers of very good players surfacing from youth teams across the country.

Vincent Ursini is a man with a mission.
He’s president of the Canadian Professional Soccer League, a loop of some of Canada’s best teams stretching from the southwestern reaches of Ontario, Canada’s largest province, east to the province of Quebec. There are 13 CPSL pro teams in Ontario, one in Quebec.

To put the CPSL in perspective, it’s Second Division pro soccer sitting just under the four A-League First Division teams that are part of a mostly U.S. north-south alignment, similar to that adopted more than half a century ago by the National Hockey League and subsequently, mainstream pro baseball and basketball. Below pro soccer is a massive amateur system in Canada, some 800,000 players, most of whom are youth and youngsters representing the country’s most played team sport.

Ursini believes the key to Canada’s position on soccer’s world stage is in its professional game. He’s not alone—Holger Osieck, Canada’s National team coach has made it clear that if Canada’s national team is to make progress, pro soccer must get its act together to accommodate the increasing numbers of very good players surfacing from youth teams across the country.

The Canadian Soccer Association, Canada’s national governing soccer body, and even the federal government, both agree.

The CSA believes that Canada should expand the First Division foursome of Montreal Impact, Toronto Lynx, Calgary Storm and the Vancouver Whitecaps, by adding cities such as Edmonton, Winnipeg, perhaps even Hamilton and Halifax. The quicker, the better.

This has been the thrust of a Canadian task force known as the CUSL, of which Ursini is a member. But not necessarily an agreeable one. While the First Division struggles to maintain four teams, let alone add more, the CPSL is exploding. And this, says Ursini, is great for Canadian soccer and is where the focus needs to be.

“Many communities in Canada would like to have a professional team—a team their youth can aspire to, but we must accept that except for a very few cities, pro soccer in Canada is for the most part, second division soccer,” he explained in Toronto recently.

“But that’s OK. Young Canadian players who are a bit special will have a choice—and the really good ones will still go overseas where they can command salaries much greater than Canadian soccer can afford and this will be the case for some years to come.”

Ursini would like to see the CPSL expand regionally across Canada, each region being a conference within the CPSL. Senior soccer in Alberta and the Pacific Coast League in British Columbia are good examples. Operating professional soccer on a regional basis would avoid extensive team travel at high cost, so often seen as the main culprit in the demise of earlier professional leagues in North America.

Canadian-born Ursini, 42, who played good soccer in Italy and Canada before taking up soccer administration at the youth level, then later was elected treasurer of the Ontario Soccer Association and a member of the Finance Committee of the CSA, is determined to see the right professional soccer structure come together. He was appointed head of the CPSL in 2000 and soon saw the potential for expansion, an opportunity to construct what many have been talking about for years.

But expansion of the CPSL and professional soccer is only part of Ursini’s equation. The pro game is very much about standards—the standard of play, condition of the grounds in which professional teams play, the right image to the fans, the media, soccer’s business partners and the public at large. The CSA is re-writing the standards to be more up-to-date and such that compliance will not be an option. But also achievable—unlike the earlier versions that were unrealistically based on pro soccer in Britain. Ursini has important input into these new standards—a role he takes seriously because, as he puts it: “It’s all part of the new structure and we need to get it right.” Most believe it’s just a matter of time before Canada is a team in the World Cup finals. But Ursini says that’s not a sure thing. He thinks there is a danger in assuming it will all just happen.

“It will only happen if we do all the right things with player development and coaching; if the national teams are properly handled and similarly, professional soccer is constructed in such a way that it will link with the other components of Canadian soccer. A lot needs to be brought together,” he cautions.