London
Free Press: The Year Soccer Really Shone
September 13, 2002
The year soccer really shone
By KATHY RUMLESKI -- London
Free Press
What a summer it's been for soccer -- locally,
nationally and internationally.
It was already the No. 1 sport in the world
when we rolled into 2002, but it has gained fans at a rapid rate in recent
months.
When South Korea, Senegal and Turkey shocked the world with their
success in the World Cup, they brought the game to people who might not
otherwise have been interested if Europe and the Americas continued to dominate.
It helped greatly that it was also held in the Far East for the first time,
with its huge population.
One in four people on the planet watched the World
Cup final between Germany and Brazil, giving the sport the biggest audience in
television history.
In Canada, the average audience for World Cup games on
the CBC was 398,000.
Then there was the under-19 FIFA world championship in
Edmonton that people are still talking about.
The under-19 squad made
Canadian soccer history as the first team to ever advance to the final of a FIFA
world championship.
A sold-out crowd of 60,000 at Commonwealth Stadium
watched the United States defeat Canada in overtime.
As FIFA president Sepp
Blatter put it, "In my 37 years in FIFA, I have never witnessed such
enthusiasm."
The interest caught everyone by surprise.
Canadian
Professional Soccer League chair Vince Ursini related a story, while in London
on Monday, about one worried FIFA official whom he talked to while in Edmonton
prior to the championship.
When the official arrived on site, he thought the
championship game would be played at the nearby 2,000-seat Clark Stadium, Ursini
said.
On learning it was at the much bigger Commonwealth Stadium, the man
tried to persuade organizers not to hold it there for fear the girls would be
playing in front of a large number of empty seats.
He was so wrong.
The
inaugural under-19 championship attracted nearly 200,000 spectators.
Buoyed
by that success, the Canadian Soccer Association submitted a bid to play host to
the women's World Cup in 2007.
When my hockey-loving father -- who hasn't
watched a soccer match since I played as a youngster -- asked me to tape the
final between Canada and the U.S. for him, that's when I knew for certain soccer
is on its way in this country.
And it's only going to get bigger.
Locally, the success of the sport continues to baffle soccer aficiandos who
thought a plateau would be reached after several successive years of growth.
But the number of people playing the game continues to increase.
That
translates into more success for London.
Eight city teams have reached the
Ontario Cup finals this summer.
After not winning an Ontario Cup title since
1998, London has now won six in the past two years with a possibility of five
more this weekend.
The city is represented in the Cup finals tomorrow and on
Sunday in men's, under-19 girls, under-17 girls and under-13 boys and girls.
It's been a lot of fun covering soccer this summer. Just a note that as the
season winds down, this is the final instalment of this page.
The year
certainly will be remembered as the year soccer really shone.
.
.