Nuke Soccer

By Jason De Vos

Offside: Fixing Canadian Soccer – Who’s in charge?
In April of 2003, the Australian Independent Soccer Review Committee released a report on the governance of soccer in Australia. Popularly known as the Crawford Report, it laid bare the problems facing soccer in Australia and put forth a number of recommendations to restructure the game down under.

Many of those recommendations were implemented, which resulted in major improvements, including the country’s successful qualification for the 2006 World Cup in Germany. Presently, Australia is well on its way to booking a place at next summer’s World Cup in South Africa.

If you have never read the Crawford Report, I urge you to do so. It can be found here.

If you find yourself experiencing a strong sense of déjà vu after reading the document, you’re not alone. I felt the exact same emotion the first time I read the Crawford Report.

In fact, I came away from it thinking that if I substituted the word Canada for Australia throughout the document, I would have a fairly accurate reflection of the problems we face in our own country.

Now I admit, there are some major differences between the states of the game in the two countries.

For example, the government of Australia, particularly the Australian Sports Commission, contributes significant amounts of money to the sport of soccer down under. The same level of financial support does not exist between the Canadian government and the sport of soccer in Canada.

There is also a significant difference in the quantity and quality of training facilities in Australia compared to Canada. The Australian Institute of Sport, for example, is a stunning facility, with 35 sport programs available in 26 different sports. It offers Australia’s best athletes access to world-class coaches, sports scientists and sports medicine practitioners in a bid to help the athletes fulfill their potential.

Quite frankly, we have nothing like it in Canada, certainly not for the game of soccer.

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