By Matt DeBock
Despite a successful inaugural season and a shot at a triple crown, the Ottawa Wizards professional soccer team is having a hard time getting noticed.
The Wizards play in the four-year-old Canadian Professional Soccer League (CPSL). After winning the OZ Optics League Cup tournament, Sept. 30, and the league regular season title , they will try to finish the season with a playoff championship .
The Wizards have compiled a 16-3-3 record and clinched the regular season title with a win over the Toronto Olympians Oct. 7.
They will contend for the Rogers Cup championship on Oct. 13-14. Even with such success, the Wizards, and the CPSL, toil in virtual obscurity.
“I’m shocked actually,” says Jim Lianos, general manager of the Wizards. While the situation is frustrating in Ottawa, it is even worse elsewhere in the league.
“We’ve done everything we can, but it’s the same situation in Toronto. We actually draw the most fans,” Lianos says.
Lianos blames the struggle for attention on a lack of media exposure, and their failure to look beyond traditional coverage, such as hockey and baseball.
Chris Bellamy, director of marketing for the CPSL, agrees.
“This is a problem North America-wide. Soccer is still a tough sell. A lot of sportswriters still see it as a step down,” he says. “We’re up against established sports. The Senators, the NFL, baseball…they’re all front page news.”
Bellamy also says many journalists find soccer difficult to follow because they did not grow up with it.
“These reporters grow up with hockey, and they know the game. We have to educate the media and make them more comfortable with soccer,” he says. “I’ve had one reporter come up to me and say that it was the first soccer game he’d covered, and ask if I could give him a rulebook.”
Lianos and Bellamy both say they will continue to try to get the information to the media and the public. The league has recently created a new position specifically to try to make inroads with the media. However, Lianos currently handles all media relations for the team in addition to being in charge of the team itself.
“One big thing is you have got to get to the kids,” Lianos says.
Lianos says successful marketing to children will lead parents to the games as well. So far, however, it has been a tough sell, even with tickets starting at three dollars.
Neither the Wizards nor the league are ready to give up, though.
“People underestimate the popularity of soccer,” Bellamy says. “The interest is very high – it’s the number one sport, participation-wise, in the country.”
Bellamy also says that the attention of both the public and the media will likely turn toward soccer for next year’s World Cup. He says the task will be to then redirect that attention to domestic soccer.
Valerie Kowal, events and communications coordinator for the Canadian Soccer Association, located in Centretown, says the struggles faced by the CPSL are not unique.
“It’s a common occurrence, even at the national level,” she says.
Kowal agrees, however, that soccer is more popular than ever, by participation. She says that in 2000 there were nearly 730,000 registered soccer players in Canada, compared to only 500,000 for hockey.
“Hockey is more expensive,” she says. “Soccer is more easily organized, cheaper, and you don’t need much equipment.”
She says this does not translate into fans because soccer is subject to weather, and does not offer the added bonuses of other sports – half time shows, instant replay, beer and hot dogs.
Lianos sees obstacles other than the media for the Wizards to overcome as well.
“Part of the problem is that we are further out,” he says, in reference to the fact that the team’s home field is the OZ Dome stadium in Carp. “Soccer is traditionally followed by immigrant communities, where soccer is much bigger in their home countries. A lot of these people live downtown, in the city, and there is no transportation to Carp.”
For people living in Centretown, traveling to Carp means a drive of nearly 30 km.
Lianos says his team will try to overcome these problems. They may also bring some games closer to home for their fans.
“Next season, we may try to have some exhibition games at Lansdowne Park,” he says.