Through the most challenging days of building the Northern Super League over the past three years, Diana Matheson kept returning to her why.
Canada remained one of the only women’s soccer powers that didn’t have a domestic women’s professional league. So Ms. Matheson, the former national team midfielder who played professionally in Europe and the U.S., fixed on building a Canadian league from scratch.
The to-do list was immense: landing team owners, sponsors, club licensing, naming the league, getting it on TV, and growing their employees from a plucky handful called Project 8 when they announced the idea in late 2022 to a Northern Super League staff of about 20 today. Its six teams have their own staff, who worked to sign talent, convincing players to take a chance on this new Canadian league over longer-running ones around the world.
Along the way, Ms. Matheson – the NSL’s chief growth officer as well as its founder – kept picturing this: travelling to every city in the NSL to see each of its six teams play their first home openers. That begins Wednesday, when the league makes history with its long-awaited debut at BC Place, as Calgary Wild FC visits Vancouver Rise FC to play the inaugural match.
Before the first whistle, Ms. Matheson says the NSL is already a top-five women’s soccer league in the world, based on the quality of coaching, players, resources, broadcast exposure, and pay. The NSL has a minimum salary of $50,000 and a $1.6-million salary cap, covering a minimum of 20 players and max of 25 per team. Clubs can designate one player whose salary does not fit into that cap.
Diana Matheson, former professional soccer player, Olympic medalist and founder of the Northern Super League.Christie Vuong/The Globe and Mail
The NSL arrives during a growth boom for women’s pro sports. Exposure, sponsorships, audiences and franchise valuations are growing for leagues like the U.S-based National Women’s Soccer League and the Women’s Super League in England. The swelling popularity of women’s basketball has also helped make the case that women’s pro sports make good business sense, as has the early success for the Professional Women’s Hockey League.
“The folks that always believed this was going to work have always been on board,” said Ms. Matheson, who studied economics at Princeton University and did UEFA’s exclusive executive-master program, which trains retired international players to be business leaders in soccer. “But then fairly, there’s a segment of fans that still need to see it to believe. So it helped to have another product in market succeeding, because then they can imagine what it will be a little easier.”
Still, the PWHL is different, in that it has all the best female hockey players in the world. To contrast, the best players in women’s soccer are scattered across different leagues around the world.
An alternate way to bring pro women’s soccer to Canada might have been pursuing an NWSL expansion franchise. But Ms. Matheson wanted to build a Canadian league instead, to keep the league in control of its vision, policies and culture, create more games and soccer jobs in Canada and tempt the country’s female stars to play at home. The NSL chose to be an independent league, rather than one financed by men’s leagues or clubs, which may have put the interests of women second.
“We went the independent route – the startup route. So my biggest stresses over the last two-and-a-half years were the same as anyone’s who have started a business lately,” said Ms. Matheson.
The 132 players who have signed to NSL teams bring a wide range of experiences – some recognizable names from Canada’s national team, some internationals, or recent university graduates. Some arrive from the U.S or Europe with a wealth of pro experience.
Each of the six NSL teams will play a 25-match regular season. The top four will advance to the playoffs, which are a home-and-away semi-final series. The winners of the semis face each other in a single-match championship game, played on Nov. 15.
President of the NSL, Christina Litz.Reanna Khan/The Canadian Press
The NSL strives to have its clubs some day join Champions Cup-style competitions against other leagues too. “We’ve had high-level conversations with the other women’s professional leagues around the world. They’re excited about us joining the mix, knowing what kind of talent Canada produces,” said NSL president Christina Litz.
The NSL will work with Dome Productions to produce its own game broadcasts, for Canadian audiences on TSN, CBC, RDS, and Radio-Canada, while ESPN+ will stream 40-plus of those broadcasts, including select playoff games and the Final to U.S. audiences.
Ms. Litz, whose résumé includes executive roles with the Canadian Football League, Woodbine Entertainment and True North Sports and Entertainment, was compelled to take this job by the NSL’s potential.
“I wouldn’t be here if I thought it was unrealistic,” said Ms. Litz. “That we could significantly grow audiences and fandom for women’s professional soccer in Canada.”
A look at the NSL’s six founding teams, with players to note
Ottawa Rapid FC
Ottawa’s club will play at TD Place, and coach Katrine Pedersen has been a big draw for players signing in Ottawa. Ms. Pedersen had starred as a player for the Danish national team and won club championships in Denmark, England and Norway.
Desiree Scott
Desiree Scott came out of retirement for this. The veteran of Canada’s national team, a three-time Olympic medalist, recently called it a career, following a 10-year NWSL career, which ended in an injury-riddled 2024 season with the KC Current. But the defensive midfielder nicknamed “The Destroyer” couldn’t pass up playing in the league her close friend Ms. Matheson has been envisioning for years: “I’ve had a lot of chats with Diana, and she inspires me daily … I still love this game, and I feel like I still have more to give. I want to impact the next generation.”
Susanne Haaland
Susanne Haaland, a Norwegian defender, brings several years of experience from Norway’s top league. “I was extremely surprised when I heard that Canada did not have a pro women’s league before this,” she said. “From Day 1, it’s more professional than the average team in Norway.”
Montreal Roses FC
Montreal’s club will play in Laval at the 5,581-capacity Centre Sportif Bois-de-Boulogne in Laval. With fresh grandstands erected around the field and a newly renovated training centre on site, it stakes a claim as Canada’s first stadium designed specifically for a women’s pro soccer club. Robert Rositoiu helms as coach, bringing experience from Ligue1 Québec, CF Montréal and the Vancouver Whitecaps Academy.
Mégane Sauvé
Mégane Sauvé, a winger from Saint-Hyacinthe, Que., comes home after playing for Sporting CP in the Portuguese women’s top-level soccer league. “You can already see in year one that investment is as good as some big clubs in Europe,” said Ms. Sauve.
Tanya Boychuk
Tanya Boychuk, an Edmonton native who has appeared for Canada’s women’s senior and U20 sides, repatriates after playing pro in Iceland and Sweden. Montreal’s facilities have impressed Ms. Boychuk: “Our facility is only for us, we’re not sharing with a men’s team or anyone else – our own weight room, locker room, kitchen, recovery. I just played in Sweden, in the top division, and we were fighting over this one purple rubber band for warm-ups there. Here we have stacks and stacks.”
Vancouver Rise FC
While the league opener features Vancouver’s side at 54,000-seat BC Place, most of its other games will take place at Swanguard Stadium, which seats 4,500 in Burnaby. That’s the hometown of Christine Sinclair, who joined Greg Kerfoot in team ownership. Stephanie Labbé, Canada’s Olympic gold medalist goalkeeper is the club’s sporting director. Anja Heiner-Moller is the coach, after leading the U-19 team for her native Denmark.
Quinn
Quinn has 106 caps with Canada’s national team and is the first-ever openly transgender and nonbinary athlete to win a medal at the Olympic Games. The midfielder comes north after six seasons with Seattle Reign FC, winning the NWSL Shield in 2022. They also played in Europe. “Through our time, I’ve seen so many people retire because they haven’t made livable wages with soccer. Thankfully, this league is giving people an opportunity to operate in a high-performance environment, and I think we can continue to push those standards. Getting a Players Association will be the next step.”
Shannon Woeller
Shannon Woeller was the club’s first signing. The defender from Vancouver has 21 national team caps, including the 2019 Women’s World Cup, and pro experience from Norway, Iceland, Germany, Spain and Sweden.
Calgary Wild FC
The 35,000-seat McMahon Stadium is getting a turf renovation to welcome Calgary Wild FC. Newly signed players have been welcomed with white cowboy hats. English coach Lydia Bedford leads the way, after assistant and head stints at Leicester City Women and Arsenal Women and Brentford men’s under-18 team.
Meikayla Moore
Meikayla Moore has been a national team player for New Zealand since 2013, including three Olympics. The defender’s career has spanned Germany, England, Scotland, and now Canada, home to a national team she’s seen thrive internationally. “The investment in the NSL has been the huge thing, like they’re trying to match the leagues, like the NWSL and the WSL. They want to be up there with the best.”
Sonia O’Neill
Sonia O’Neill is a member of the Venezuelan national team, but she’s also Canadian and was raised in Toronto. The versatile midfielder has been playing professionally for clubs across Europe, most recently for the second-tier London City Lionesses in England. Now mother to a young daughter, taking part in a new league in Canada felt right: “It just aligns with who I am.”
AFC Toronto
Toronto’s club will play its first-ever game at BMO Field on April 19 and then host the rest of its home games at York University. On top of its Canadian talent, the team has lots of international players, from Japan, South Korea, Finland, Nigeria and the U.S. Marko Milanovic is coach, previously of North Toronto Soccer where he coached in League1 Ontario’s Premier Division.
Emma Regan
Emma Regan is a Canadian national team midfielder with eight international caps to her name, who turned heads while earning a Performance of the Match nod in Canada’s 1-1 draw against China in February. The Vancouver native played pro in Denmark after captaining the Longhorns at the University of Texas. “We are starting in a much better spot than a lot of [women’s] leagues started,” said Ms. Regan of the NSL. “You can still go to Europe, you can still go to the U.S., but now playing in Canada is another option.”
Victoria Pickett
Victoria Pickett, a Barrie native, has been playing in the NWSL since 2021, and is now on loan to AFC Toronto from the North Carolina Courage. “To be able to say like that I’m playing alongside a Canadian national team member is fantastic,” said Ms. Pickett about having Ms. Regan as a teammate. “Players like her are going to help the league grow.”
Halifax Tides FC
This will be the first-ever women’s pro sports franchise in the Maritime provinces. They already have a wildly popular mascot, Jawslyn the shark. Lewis Page leads as coach, his journey including roles with the UPEI men’s and women’s soccer teams, and Canada’s youth development and women’s national teams. The club’s home games will take place at Wanderers Grounds.
Erin McLeod
Erin McLeod was the first player signed, the former long-time national team goalkeeper for Canada. After playing professionally in the NWSL and then Iceland in recent years, Ms. McLeod, now 42, is putting off retirement to play in this new league, and alongside her wife, Icelandic midfielder Gunnhildur (Gunny) Yrsa Jónsdóttir. “This is year one, so none of us have played together before,” said Ms. McLeod. “So we’re going to have to adapt a lot and learn a lot about one another, how to bring out the best of one another.”
Christabel Oduro
Christabel Oduro brings a load of experience from clubs across Europe over the past decade, most recently playing in Turkey. She’s struck by the excitement from the city: “Everybody you talk to [it’s] like, ‘Oh, we have season tickets, can’t wait to watch you guys play, Go Tides,’ you hear that from people you just see on the street. We are definitely feeling the love.”
