This might sound cheap. But could Canada send someone to qualify for Concacaf Champions' Cup. Apparently, PR Islanders did and they are in the same situation as TFC, Impact, or Whitecaps. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CFU_Club_Championship_2006-07 Maybe we could award the spot to the Canada Open Cup winner and they could play off against the third place team from Central America.
Since TFC can qualify through MLS (not this year though ) I would be in favour of letting Montreal and Vancouver playing a one-off game in a neutral site (Toronto maybe) for the Canadian slot. Another solution would be to have TFC, Montreal and Vancouver and the 10 CSL teams play a single-game knockout tournament (with TFC, Montreal and Vancouver getting first round byes with the 10 CSL teams being randomly drawn). Or, if you want to take TFC out of the mix due to their being able to qualify through MLS, take the 10 CSL teams plus Montreal and Vancouver you could still play a similar knockout tournament with Montreal, Vancouver and the winners of each of the two CSL Divisions getting first round byes and the remaining eight teams playing one-off games against each other and then being randomly drawn against the 4 bye teams.
Toronto's ability to qualify through MLS should have no bearing in preventing them from qualifying through a Canadian competition. Simply have it work such that if a Canadian team qualifies via their league and they win the Canadian compeition, then the second place team in the competition gets the spot. That would make it similar in spirit to something like the FA Cup, where if the winner of the FA Cup is already qualified for European competition via the league table, then the spot goes to the 7th place team (at least last year it did). Cheers!
Two points: 1. I'm not sure that TFC can qualify through MLS. I believe those spots actually belong to the USSF. The USSF just uses MLS to help decide which team gets one of the spots. Thus TFC is ineligible much as they are ineligible for a US Open Cup berth no matter where they place in MLS. 2. Why not just use the Open Canada Cup as the qualifier (as I and others have suggested before)? It already includes teams from BC, Ontario, and Quebec. Just get the USL teams and TFC to actually sign up (probably by offering them seeding) and you're done.
Agreed - I'd use more expletives to describe them but that's neither here nor there. My big concern is that nothing is going to change and we're left with the same bunch of clowns who trot out youth participation numbers while the professional organization gets zero support. I'm all for working/supporting/organizing a grass roots protest (over and above the black shirt at the Costa Rica game). Does anyone have an idea of how this would be possible within the operating mandate of the CSA? I would assume there is a federal grant system that is reviewed periodically that is open to the public where a focused petition or documentation of the CSA's negligence can be put forth, I would imagine that 20 000 signatures from fans at a Canada game at the NSS. At a bare minimum we should be asking for: Outline of qualification process for CCC which Canada is entitled to representation Open Canada Cup tournament be played by all Canadian teams along the lines of FA Cup or US Open Cup World class support and infrastructure for Men's National Team, with a stated goal of qualification for 2010 world cup Interprovincial Youth tournaments for U17, U15 etc. Essentially a system of excellence along the lines of what Hockey Canada has. These points need to be better clarified to remove ambiguity to get the CSA to do its job.
Irrespective of the level of the Open Canada Cup it is, at present, the best we have. If we are to have an open cup of some sort (presumably including the big teams) to decide a CCC qualifier we have two choices: 1. Use the existing OCC and improve it by inducing the big teams to join (by offering a CCC spot) and making the changes that would flow from that. 2. Abandon the OCC and replace it with something that will end up looking exactly the same anyway. (There are only so many ways to run an open cup.) Given these two choices, why not just stick with a tournament that has already been going on for ten years?
You're talking about a tournament that no one really cares about and isn't even of importance to the CSL teams. Why didn't Ottawa St. Anthony's and the Toronto Lynx return to the Cup this year? Obviously they don't hold this tournament in high esteem as to waste their time competing in it. You're so obsessed with an open cup that you rather ignore the reality: Top teams aren't going to give a damn unless you force them to. That is making them field the same lineup that they would use in a regular league match. No one will care about an Open Cup tournament when they have no guarantee the teams they will see are the best that they can offer. The Islanders qualified for the CCC by using their "Islanders B" side in the Puerto Rican competition. Hard to take their entry serious when they don't even field the best for the domestic competition.
Doyle, So let's back up a step, then. Do you think Canada should have an open cup? I don't necessarily mean the OCC as it stands, just do you think we should have an open cup of some sort at all?
There will be no cup at all. There's far too many ducks to get into line to make it work. The only way Canada will get into the CCC and be taken serious is through a Canadian League.