De Vos on Canada's footballing obstacles
With Canada's European-based players assembling for a training camp with new manager Frank Yallop in Manchester this week, captain Jason de Vos will be looking to write a new chapter in his international career.
The Wigan Athletic skipper has been getting back into the swing of things at The JJB Stadium since his recovery from a broken bone in his foot earlier in the season.
His commitment to both club and country has made him a well-respected individual in both circles and like all players, de Vos has big career hopes for the future.
In part two of an exclusive interview with skysports.com last September, the tall centre back gives us his insight into the difficulties his country faces in becoming a competitive footballing nation.
Canada is one of the few industrialised nations globally not to currently have a domestic professional league and despite recent efforts to resurrect a national championship since the fold of the old Canadian Soccer League in the early 1990s, de Vos believes starting up a new league will be difficult.
"I think it would be very difficult to start a league from scratch," said de Vos.
"You only need to look at the financial climate in European football right now to understand that it's very difficult financially.
"Clubs over here are going to the wall all the time and players' salaries are coming down drastically from the levels they were at a couple of years ago.
"Clubs can no longer afford to sustain the sort of wage bills that they had in the past because they're getting the revenues through the doors to justify it.
"The start-up costs for getting a league going in Canada is a major stumbling block.
"If you look to the United States as an example, the MLS has lost an incredible amount of money in the years it has been operating and the US (Soccer) Federation has put in a lot of money into that league to keep it going.
"They're also in a position where they have some very wealthy benefactors in place.
"Without that sort of financial backing, it would be very difficult to start up a league of that calibre.
"The idea is one that has been kicked around by a lot of people over a long period of time about starting up a league again.
"The bottom line is - if you're going to start up a league from scratch, it has to be done as a business.
"No business is going to be successful if it continues to lose money, regardless of what industry it's in and soccer is no different.
"If you start up a league, the question marks are - what kind of gates are you going to get, what sort of revenue are you going to have and what sort of corporate backing are going to have₻and you need to know all that before you can start bringing in players.
"Better players attract better crowds - one feeds off the other."
Despite the obstacles, the 30-year-old thinks a structure can be built with the existing Canadian sides that play in the American Second Division 'A-League'.
"You look at the likes of the Montreal Impact, Vancouver Whitecaps, Toronto Lynx - they're in place and have been operating for a number of years now and they've done a good job," de Vos added.
"There's definitely a market there for that.
"I think if we can expand the number of A-League teams in Canada gradually over the next couple of years, that's probably going to be the best way to go about things.
"It could very well happen that there's a Canadian div
