The first year with two Canadian NASL teams was a decent one off the field. Edmonton averaged 3385 per game. This is up from 2437 in 2013 and 1492 in 2012. This is definitely a very encouraging trend of increasing attendance. Ottawa averaged 4492 in their inaugural year in the league. The season average was 3715 if we eliminate the 14 000 plus they drew to the first game in their new stadium but the fall average without the big game was still 4359. In other words, once they moved to their permanent home they stayed above 4000 average in "legitimate" attendance. My own estimate is that a D2 soccer team in Canada needs somewhere between 4000 and 5000 in average attendance to be long term viable. At the lower end of that range, they are still tenuous and need to be pretty sharp operators to stay afloat, but it is doable. Any average over 5000 and a decently run team is good to go. Using this standard I'm not prepared to say that either Canadian NASL team is on solid financial ground yet. The signs, however, are positive and hopefully within a couple of years both teams will be above 5000 and we can focus exclusively on the play on the field and not have concerns in the backs of our minds about whether the teams will be back next season. This would be positive not only for fans of those teams but for fans on the national team as we see the player pool continue to expand. It would also presumably be a strong signal to potential ownership groups in other cities that they can make money at this. If strong, viable clubs in Edmonton and Ottawa lead to strong, viable clubs in Hamilton and Calgary, so much the better.
Knowing a little bit about the Ottawa situation I would be comfortable in them staying around. Owned by a bigger entitity OSEG which owns both a popluar Junior Hockey club as well as selling out every home game for the exapnsion CFL franchise. OSEG manages both the stadium and Arena that are connected have have been renovated. As well as property around the stadium. The Fury club and academy already existed with its highest level being the PDL. So the owner of the Fury was invited to join the Ownership Group to run the soccer portion. FCE is still a one owner show. Building up Clarke stadium has been huge. Adding better and more permanent seating as well as new field turf that is of higher grade and eliminated gridiron football lines for matches.
There is no doubt that being part of OSEG is a huge benefit for the Fury. The owners have deep pockets, they have a stadium to generate dates for even if the soccer team isn't very profitable, and the Fury can piggyback on the same ticket selling, advertising, etc. apparatus that the other teams use rather than having to do it all from scratch. That last translates into lower operating costs. That said, I'd still like to see them get the average up over 5000 to the point where they are making money. That way they won't get dropped when fortunes sag a bit on the football side.