Although I'm sure no one cares, I thought I'd post this anyway. The St. Lawrence Laurentians have won their 8th straight Challenge Cup by beating Holy Cross FC of St. John's 1-0 in the final, after extra time. The match was watched by 2500 people at the King George the 5th Stadium in St. John's. And it was the main sports headline in the newspapers here, ahead of the U19 women's loss to the States, and ahead of baseball, hockey... etc. http://www.laurentianshomepage.com
Correction: The match was played in St. Lawrence, and the crowd was closer to 3,500. I just saw the highlites on television. It seemed like a great match, with a really intense atmostphere.
You can see the local news report later this evening or tomorrow by going to http://www.stjohns.cbc.ca/ and clicking "Canada Now" It's the third or 4th item on the news. You'll only be able to see it tonight and tomorrow, though.
Yes, there's not much in the way of news, and if you think that was bad, you should listen to the morning call-in show. That's more like torture than entertainment. St. John's is a party town, though. But I spent a few days near Bonavista (north coast) and I was so bored I went to the same museum 3 times. It was horrible. The report said something about St. Lawrence playing other teams from around Canada. Anyone know what this is about? I remain very impressed with the crowd. One could say that 200% of St. Lawrence turned out, as the crowd was over double the population of the community (1500).
Information on the national Challenge cup can be found at http://www.2002nationals.com/ (click Challenge Cup)
First day of competition today. Freezing cold, but no wind and sunny. They were expecting about 5000 people to turn out for the St. Lawrence-Nova Scotia match. I'll update with the scores as soon as I know.
PEI 2-1 Saskachewan Manitoba 1-1 Ontario Alberta 3-0 New Brunswick Later tonight: Newfoundland v Quebec They got 4,800 last night, and are hoping to get attendence up to around 5,500 tonight. Not bad for a small town...
Newfoundland 3-1 Alberta Manitoba 2-1 Nova Scotia The final will be: Newfoundland v Manitoba So the team that finished in last place last year is in the final this year... and there will be a very large partizan crowd at it... Should be a great match.
Manitoba are Challenge Cup Champions. They beat the home side 1-0 after Extra Time. The match was watched by a record breaking crowd of 7000.