The Current - Diana Matheson on the long road to women's pro soccer in Canada

Episode Date: February 20, 2025

The first game is fast approaching for the Northern Super League, Canada's first ever women's professional soccer league. Soccer star and league co-founder Diana Matheson tells us about the work to get the six Canadian teams up and running — and how fans can show up to support them.

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This is a CBC Podcast. Hello, it's Matt here. Thanks for listening to The Current wherever you're getting this podcast. Before we get to today's show, wonder if I might ask a favor of you if you could hit the follow button on whatever app you're using. There is a lot of news that's out there these days. We're trying to help you make sense of it all and give you a bit of a break from some

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This was a glorious moment in Canadian soccer. The London 2012 Olympics, a Canadian player kicks the ball, bounces off a French player away from goal, and then a ponytailed figure in red swoops in. McHughing up here, edge of the area, Matheson back in, get the shot through, Schmitz blocked off, Charlie Kavanagh would have gone and won it right at the death here, and the goal scorer is Diana Matheson, 28 years of age in her second Olympic Games. That bronze medal winning player is my next guest, Diana Matheson, former national women's soccer player, Olympic bronze medalist, Canadian soccer legend and co-founder of the Northern

Super League. This is Canada's first ever women's professional soccer league. It kicks off in just a couple of months time with six teams from six cities, Halifax, Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal, Calgary, and Vancouver. And today the Northern Super League announces its inaugural season schedule. Diana Matheson is with me in studio. Good morning. Morning. Thanks for having me back. That was a big moment.

Um, I was in a pub in London watching you score that goal. I think my voice is still destroyed from screaming at the television, but this is another big moment, um, in sport, the announcement of this program. You were on the current, what, three years ago talking about this and you said, there's no point in making them, young soccer players, dream anymore unless we're going to build somewhere for them to work. What does it feel like to create that? To create that place where they can land?

Oh, that's it. I don't remember saying that, but that's not a bad quote, is it? Yeah. I mean, that's what it's about. And we were just talking about it before this. You can't dream about being it unless you see it. And you know, whether you want to be a player,

a coach, a woman in business, I wanted a job in Canada. That's part of why we did this. Whether you want to be in, in sport media or media, like yourself, it was about creating those opportunities for, for kids to be able to dream and stay in Canada and work and build here. What we were talking about was the fact that you, I was asking when you knew that you could have a future in the sport and you didn't see that really until when. Yeah, there was, I think until I made the national team, I didn't really know women's

soccer could be a job. I didn't know I could compete in the Olympics. The first taste of it for women's soccer players in Canada, I think was the 99 World Cup in the US, huge deal. And that's when you even said, oh, women's soccer is a thing. Uh, I know for, for my wife, I was just talking

about this yesterday, she was a speed skater. So she got to grow up watching Katrina Lamadone. That birthed her Olympic dreams of speed skating. But she also got to watch or listen to Steve Armadich on the call. The brilliant broadcaster. Brilliant, the legend.

And that birthed her broadcast dreams. And now she's a broadcaster. And that's again, what we want to do with the Northern Super League, create these incredible role models and leaders for kids to see something they wanna be when they grow up. Anastasia's a great broadcaster. She's in very high on that too.

Yeah, she's in a lot. You had to build your career outside of this country, right, what did that look like? My pathway was pretty similar to everyone before me and up into this point. I played all my youth soccer here in our incredible youth system. After I graduated high school, I went down to the US through the NCAA system.

I played in Princeton for four years. I was playing for the national team at that time. And then after that, I wanted to compete being at, I wanted to continue to be at the highest level competing for Canada. So I went and played pro. I played pro in Europe, in Norway for about five years. And then following 2012, when the NWSL, the league in the US started, I went and played there for the remainder of my career.

I think I was down in the US for about seven years. And then I retired, I came back home. I wanted to be involved in women's pro soccer still and looked around and there was still no jobs in Canada. And again, a lot of my generation when they retired, stayed in the sport as coaches, as GMs, as broadcasters. And again, they were all leaving the country. You've said, and this speaks directly to that, that a lot of players from my

generation lived at a time when women's professional sports were being run in a way that didn't believe in women's professional sports, and it was a tough culture and a market to operate in. We just heard from, I mean, a 12 year old who's a role model to other kids who play flag football. She sees herself in the Olympics in years ahead. How has that culture changed, do you think, since the time that you had to leave and that the culture didn't support and believe in women's sports?

Yeah, it's shifted hugely. It's unbelievable, the power of mindset and mentality. And John Herdman, who I was a huge impact on Canadian soccer and on myself, he- Former coach for the men's and women's team. Absolutely. He, he used to say, don't put yourself in a performance cage. If you see yourself on the field as this type

of player and you can only do a certain number of things and you know, you're not someone who shoots outside of the box, guess what? You're never going to take shots from outside the box. Don't put yourself in a performance cage. And I think that's what was done with women's pro sport in the time we grew up.

It wasn't, you know, everyone you would hear it commonly said, people don't watch women's cage and I think that's what was done with women's pro sport. In the time we grew up, it wasn't, you know, everyone you would hear it commonly said, people don't watch women's sport, women's sport doesn't make money. So what happens, it doesn't get invested in, it doesn't get marketed, it's not put on TV and then people complain when the viewership or attendance is low. And that's shifted hugely in the last five years because of the culture shifting, because there's actually data out there that shows really clearly, anytime you put women's pro sport on television, anytime you start to invest in it,

it grows and grows and grows and it's just getting started. You went to business school to kind of wrap your head around the finance side of this and the structural part of it. How confident are you that there is an audience that's there? I mean, the idea is if you build it, they will come, but will people come in the numbers that you need to support this? Yeah, that's a great question.

Yeah, if you build it, they will come has absolutely been the philosophy. And the first question, the first benchmark, I think is the talent gonna come? Because we are, we're soccer, which means we are in a global ecosystem. It is not the case that there's one predominantly successful league in North America.

No, there's leagues all over the world. There's dozens of women's pro soccer leagues around the world. So we have to compete for coaches. We have to compete for players, all the talent that's out there. And I think we've seen the talent show up. So if you build it, they will come. We have incredible international women's coaches that have moved to Canada. We have employees at the league and clubs, just incredible international talent

that's come here. Canadians that have come home. Uh, we have, uh, you know, there'll be a hundred to 150 players in year one. The majority of those are Canadians returning home from some sort of pro contract abroad. Uh, as well as international players from all over the world, they're choosing to play in Canada. We've got recognizable Canadian names and women's national team stars like Quinn, legends like Desiree Scott, Erin McLeod, uh, current, uh, women's national team stars like Quinn, legends like Desiree Scott, Erin McLeod, current women's national team players, Emma Reagan. And we're going to have all these future stars, the next Christine St.

Clair's that are going to grow up and play through this league. Now it's the fans, are there people going to come in the, in the fans? That's the, that's the big question. And I'll tell you right now, you know, when this thing kicks off, it's already going to be one of the top five leagues in the world in this global landscape. And we know that because of our salary cap, the players were attracting, the revenues were driving.

That's a statement that you just made. It's, it's, it's the fact, average attendance worldwide, I guarantee you, we're going to be in that top five already, but I think Canadians should know by now women's soccer wants to be on the podium here and it's going to be the fans that, that drive that. And I expect to see some fans in Vancouver for opening day, April 16th BC place.

That place has some incredible women's soccer moments. We then got the Saturday, April 19th in Toronto, um, at BMO field. And then we're going to have the rest of the home openers in the weeks that follow that mid April to May. And I can't wait to see the fans that show up and how they represent their own cities. I have to let you go, but you know what's been really neat in watching the professional women's hockey league is,

we talked about the Canadian Soccer Association and they didn't sell jerseys, for example, for women players. There's a women's hockey league and you now see those jerseys around. You see people wearing those jerseys, like just on the street. Do you know what I mean? Is that what you're going to see?

You're going to see fans from these teams wearing those jerseys, like just on the street. Do you know what I mean? Is that what you're going to see? You're going to see fans from these teams wearing those jerseys out and about? Yeah, absolutely. And honestly, so that's the big, the big announcement today is schedule. The schedule is out at noon today, so people can drop on nsl.ca, buy tickets, buy season passes. Then jerseys I think are coming in March.

And I'm so excited for Canadians to see the jerseys. The clubs have done an incredible job bringing to life some incredible designs. So that's going to be pretty exciting as well. You've made something. It's happening. You know what? Building a Canadian business. It hasn't been easy, only had to do it once.

And I've been dreaming for two and a half years for these opening games. So I can't wait to see Canadians there. Diana, thank you. Thanks for having me as always. Diana Matheson, a two-time Olympic bronze medalist, former national team soccer player, a legend in the sport in this country, and co-founder of the Northern Super League, she was here in our studio in Toronto.