Canadian Premier League

[Nerroth]

This year will mark the onset of the Canadian Premier League, a new "Division 1" soccer league for various professional clubs across Canada:

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Seven clubs will begin play in 2019, though efforts are afoot to expand the league going forward.

Canada's three Major League Soccer clubs (L'Impact de Montréal, Toronto FC, and Vancouver Whitecaps FC) will not take part in this league, and nor (for now) will Ottawa Fury FC of the United Soccer League. Those clubs will, however, have an opportunity to encounter CPL clubs in the Canadian Championship; the winner of which represents Canada in the CONCACAF Champions League.

Also, a berth has been assigned in the CONCACAF League for a CPL club; the CL winner earns a berth in the CCL proper.

 

[Nerroth]

The 2019 CPL format and schedule have been posted.

The league will operate a split season, with the Spring and Fall winners meeting at the end of the season for the CPL Championship match.

Also, the set of matches which will determine this season's CONCACAF League entrant have been established.

 

[Nerroth]

The first weekend's worth of CPL matches have been played:

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In terms of broadcasting, ten of this season's matches are being broadcast on CBC in Canada, with ten more being streamed by CBC Sports (as listed here); while the full season - along with this year's Canadian Championship - is being streamed on a newly-launched service called OneSoccer.

 

[Nerroth]

Three more CPL clubs held their home openers over the weekend:

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The quality of the highlight editing seems to have taken a dip, alas.

In any event, rather than posting every last highlight clip to this thread, I thought it might be apt to at least post the clubs' respective home openers for the time being, so as to show what their home stadia look like. Which leaves two more teams - York9 and FC Edmonton - to go for this season.

 

[Nerroth]

These are the highlights from the last two home openers:

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The FCE clip is from a couple of weeks ago, but I wanted to wait until the York9 home clip was posted.


Cavalry FC have won all seven of their matches played thus far: five in league play, and two in the Canadian Championship. It's unfortunate that they are not eligible for CONCACAF League qualification in 2019, in that they are not one of the three teams pre-selected for consideration; though at least one of those three teams, Forge FC, is currently in second place.