A brush with soccer stardom

Halifax may not have a professional soccer team calling it home, or even Nova Scotia in general for that matter. But that didn’t stop Halifax from having a pretty strong presence at the FIFA Women’s World Cup games played in Moncton near the end of June.

We just had to call upon our up-and-coming young players to represent our city and our province on the international stage … or, rather, the field.

FIFA is currently taking Canada by storm as its Women’s World Cup is played throughout the country, and that included seven games held in Moncton, New Brunswick. FIFA and its major sponsors had a number of ceremonial roles to fill at each game, and when it came time to fill those roles for the Moncton games, they looked to local youth clubs here at home for volunteers.

The Storm Soccer Club in Dartmouth, a team sponsored by major FIFA sponsor Adidas, were among the local soccer clubs enlisted.

“They were looking for an Adidas club to provide flag bearers, for the yellow FIFA Fair Play flag,” says Clark Bain, president of Storm Soccer. “That’s really how it came to us, was through that.”

“Our job was to hold a flag and walk out onto the field as a flag bearer for the FIFA Fair Play yellow flag,” says Noah Lincourt, 16, who plays Left Defence with Storm Soccer. “It was pretty amazing.”

A number of teams from the Halifax County United Soccer Club were also invited to participate in the games, including their U-10 Boys team, who escorted players out onto the field.

“We had a couple who were flag bearers, as well as a team who was able to walk out with some of the players onto the field for the opening [ceremonies] for the games,” says Katie Collar, academy director for Halifax County United.

“We went out and held the players’ hands, went onto the field, then stood in front of them for the national anthem,” says Simon Foote, age nine, who helped escort the Brazilian team onto the field with the rest of his U-10 Boys teammates. “At the beginning, I was kind of nervous. But then once I got out onto the field and I saw everyone, then I was relaxed and I felt excited.”

Flag bearing and holding players hands might seem like a small gesture, but those gestures have an enormous impact on the kids who got to experience them, according to their club leaders.

“I think that it’s a phenomenal thing for youth soccer, and for sport in Canada in general,” says Collar, who believes this experience gave her players up-close role models they could identify with. “Having the World Cup here, first of all, is huge. To get kids involved, and to get the excitement around the sport that we don’t necessarily have in Canada overall, just having the World Cup here has already brought tons of excitement around the sport.”

“I think, kids being kids, they probably won’t realize the impact of it until they look back on it in 20 years time,” says Bain. “The maritimes don’t host massive international tournaments like that that often, so these opportunities, I think, for players that age come along once in a lifetime. For us to be involved with it, and for our players to have that opportunity, is just superb.”

“It was a real coup for Nova Scotia,” adds Bain.

That said, the enormity of the opportunity to share the field with the best soccer players on the planet has not been lost on these kids, who have all been inspired by the experience to put their all into the sport.

“I just began playing recently, but I hope to take it to a university level. Maybe even the provincial team,” says Bain’s daughter Emily Herbert, 15, who has grown up watching FIFA with her family. “It kind of gave me an idea of what I can do, and the level that I can make if I try.”

“I think it did push me to think that, maybe it is possible to pursue soccer in the future,” says Lincourt, who would love to see a Maritime Provinces soccer team form someday. “I think it really gave me a little bit of motivation.”

“When I watched them play, it was cool, because I’ve never actually seen a World Cup game live before,” says Foote, who learned how to say ‘good luck’ in Portuguese just for this game. “It kind of made me feel like I should do better soccer, and I watched how they played so I could get better at soccer.”

That said, players and their coaches would like to see Nova Scotia put more resources and attention into the game of soccer here at home, so that these up-and-coming talents can someday represent their home province by playing, rather than by flag bearing.

“I think that there’s a huge opportunity here to grow soccer, and it starts with the recognition of the game, and the excitement around the game,” says Collar. “I think Soccer Nova Scotia in general is working in the right direction.”

Until then, the players involved have one last thing to say to FIFA for giving them this once-in-a-lifetime chance.

“Thank you very much for the opportunity,” says Foote. “I had a great time!”