Does Anyone Take The OSA Seriously Anymore?

The state of the Canadian National programs and the National Teams is in ruins, the development concept (Provincial Program and NTC) that Canada and Ontario have been following for decades has been exposed as a sham, the club controlled leagues are identified as a major impediment to the proper growth of the players, yet the OSA is not interested in any of that.


The OSA is only interested in recycling their old boys!

The recent flame out of Canada’s Women’s National Team at the World Cup 2011 Tournament (Canada finished last with 1 goal scored and 3 shots on goal for the entire tournament), has continued an alarming trend that has seen very poor performances by our National Teams at the:

- 2011 Men’s Gold Cup
- U17 Women’s World Cup 2010
- U17 Men’s World Cup 2011
- U20 Women’s CONCACAF WC qualification 2009


To be fair Canada did manage to win the CONCACAF titles at the U17 (2010) and Senior levels (2011) respectively, but crashed spectacularly when the weight of expectations at the World Cup were squarely on their shoulders.

The overall consensus is that Canada lacks the ability and the knowledge to produce top level players capable of competing mentally, physically and technically at the highest level.

The glaring lack of individual skill and technical and tactical nuances demonstrated by Canadian players has shone a spotlight in the massive deficiencies and incompetence prevalent in Canada’s Player Development Program at all levels.

Nowhere is this best illustrated than on the women’s side of the game where Canada, as an early adapter to the female game, enjoyed a considerable advantage in time and resources over traditional soccer powers that have only now started to take the game seriously on the distaff side.

However, that advantage was lost in the shadowy world of glaring incompetence, regional politics, old-boy back-scratching and mismanagement of time and resources available by the soccer authorities in Canada and especially Ontario.

This has only served to stagnate and to distort the proper environment required for Canada to compete at the highest levels of the game.

Canada is now unquestionably a third world soccer nation on both sides of the gender divide.

Over the years, the soccer authorities in Canada have produced numerous documents designed to stem the flow of ineptitude, turn the development process in to a cohesive and productive operation and create an environment for coaches and players to thrive and flourish for the long term benefit of the Canadian soccer programs.

The latest of these documents is named the Long Term Player Development (LTPD) program, the new attempt to define a “rational pathway for player development in this country”.

If this document looks familiar, it is because this document is another re-hash of many of the documents that preceded it; all designed to correct Canada’s glaring lack of ability on the soccer pitch. 


These documents all basically say the same thing; the only major difference is that the dates of implementation and completion are constantly changed to protect the incompetent.

However, the real document the CSA and its Provincial minions need to embrace is a Canadian version of the Crawford Report; (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_Report_of_the_Independent_Soccer_Review_Committee), the revolutionary document that turned soccer in Australia from a political and regional mess (sound familiar?) in to a growing force who are consistently qualifying for major tournaments on both the male and female side of the game.

Not surprisingly, there does not seem to be any of the old boys on Metcalfe Street or Vaughan too interested in implementing any version of this report!

The soccer authorities would rather re-cycle old ideas under different titles rather than provide a true new direction. The document in whatever title you may have read it is not the problem, the correct implementation of the report is where it all falls apart every time.

Ontario as Canada’s largest populated Province leads the way with participation numbers in excess of 500,000 registered players. Not surprisingly, the OSA has also led the way in overall ineptitude.

The sad state of soccer in the Province of Ontario is a direct result of mismanagement, old boy politics, cronyism and incompetence by OSA; the very organization that now believes it deserves the right to remedy the current state of the game, despite having created many of the systemic problems that now need to be unraveled by decades of inaction and abuse.

How do they intend to accomplish this? Instead of fresh new faces and ideas, the OSA believes that the very same cronies that helped create the crisis are the only ones that should be tasked with fixing it.

Hence the OSA is only truly interested in recycling; recycling the very same incompetent old boys into positions as part of the strategic teams overseeing and implementing the LTPD.

Only at organizations such as the OSA can massive incompetence and blatant ignorance of what is needed to fix the game be rewarded with a series of promotions!

One only has to look at the recent appointments to the LTPD committee as well as the new Director of Coach Development to gain an insight to how out of touch the OSA actually is.

The OSA appointees to the LTPD committee are designed to maintain the status quo while giving lip service to the change required in regenerating soccer in one of Canada’s most important markets.

They are not the catalyst for change but rather more recycled old boys desperately clinging on for fear of losing their positions on the gravy train.

More disturbing is the recycling of another old boy to the very important position of Director of Coach Development. This same individual is responsible for the removal of virtually all skilled players he over saw as Provincial Coach in favour of the big, athletic, long ball specialists that have been exposed and embarrassed on the biggest global stage; the World Cup.

This individual, who in his tenure as a Provincial Coach, was not capable of training any player with skill or coaching any style apart from “kick and pray” direct soccer, is now responsible for the training and mentoring of the coaches tasked with the identification, training and development of the next generation of players for Canada’s National Programs; players who will be expected to be technically gifted, tactically astute and athletically superior.

With this level of incompetence it is no wonder why Canada is no longer competitive at any level on the International stage!

Yet it seems that no broom really sweeps clean at the OSA. Old, out of touch, one dimensional flunkies who are responsible for the current woeful state of affairs in Ontario soccer, are brushed off, cleaned up and trotted out as being the new answer to the same old problems.

The OSA once again has proven by its actions that they are only interested in recycling their old boy network, not in taking the bold steps necessary to revolutionize soccer in Ontario.

Is there any credibility left up in Vaughan?