League1 Alberta (L1AB) is a proposed semi-professional men's and women's

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

league in

Alberta Alberta ( ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is part of Western Canada and is one of the three prairie provinces. Alberta is bordered by British Columbia to the west, Saskatchewan to the east, the Northwest Ter ...

, Canada, to be sanctioned by the

Canadian Soccer Association The Canadian Soccer Association (Canada Soccer) is the governing body of soccer in Canada. It is a national organization that oversees the Canadian men's and women's national teams for international play, as well as the respective junior sides ( ...

and the

Alberta Soccer Association The Alberta Soccer Association (ASA) is the governing body for soccer in the Canadian province of Alberta. The association was formed in 1911 as the ''Alberta Football Association''. The ASA is a member of the national governing body, the Canadian ...

as a tier 3 league in the Canadian soccer league system. Belonging to the League1 Canada organization, the men's division will fall below the Canadian Premier League (CPL), and both divisions will be equivalent to current pro-am leagues in

British Columbia British Columbia (commonly abbreviated as BC) is the westernmost province of Canada, situated between the Pacific Ocean and the Rocky Mountains. It has a diverse geography, with rugged landscapes that include rocky coastlines, sandy beaches, ...

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

, and

Quebec Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...

. The league will begin in 2023 as an exhibition series, and plans to fully launch in 2024.

History

In 2021, a group of clubs from British Columbia, Alberta, and Manitoba organized the

2021 Summer Series The 2021 Summer Series was a series of friendly soccer matches played between six clubs from Alberta, British Columbia, and Manitoba. The eight matches were held to showcase a potential national second division within the Canadian soccer league ...

, a series of friendly soccer matches played between Western Canadian soccer clubs to showcase a potential national second division. In 2022, another exhibition showcase was organized by four clubs – three from Alberta (

Calgary Foothills FC Calgary Foothills Football Club (CFFC) is a Canadian soccer club based in Calgary, Alberta, that competes in USL League Two (USL2). The club was founded as a youth club in 1972 and joined as a USL2 franchise in 2015. The team plays its home gam ...

Edmonton Scottish The Edmonton Scottish Soccer Club, better known as Edmonton Scottish, is a Canadian semi-professional soccer club based in Edmonton, Alberta. Competing continuously in the Alberta Major Soccer League (AMSL) since 1992, the club also fields r ...

, BTB Soccer Academy) and one from Manitoba (

FC Manitoba FC Manitoba is a Canadian soccer team based in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada that plays in USL League Two, the fourth tier of the United States soccer league system. The club was founded in 2010 as WSA Winnipeg. In 2020, the club was acquired by a ...

) – as an entity known as ''Central League1''. In March 2023, League1 Alberta was announced with an exhibition series being organized, with six clubs participating (five in each gendered division) – the Calgary Foothills, Edmonton Scottish, St. Albert Impact, and BTB Soccer Academy would field teams of both genders, while Cavalry FC would field a team in the men's series and the

Calgary Blizzard Calgary Blizzard Soccer Club is a Canadian soccer team based in Calgary, Alberta that plays in the men's and women's divisions of League1 Alberta. History The club was founded in 1967 with a team of 11 and 12-year-old boys, who represented t ...

in the women's division. The first matches will be played on May 12, 2023. An official league season is planned to be launched for the 2024 season.

Teams

Currently five men's teams and five women's teams have been announced to participate in the exhibition series, of which three are based in

Greater Calgary The Calgary Metropolitan Region (CMR), also commonly referred to as the Calgary Region, is a conglomeration of municipalities centred on Calgary, the largest city in Alberta. With the Government of Alberta's establishment of the Calgary Metropo ...

and three are based in Greater Edmonton.

References

{{CONCACAF third leagues Soccer leagues in Canada Women's soccer leagues in Canada

Can Can may refer to: Containers * Aluminum can * Drink can * Oil can * Steel and tin cans * Trash can * Petrol can * Metal can (disambiguation) Music * Can (band), West Germany, 1968 ** ''Can'' (album), 1979 * Can (South Korean band) Other * C ...

League1 Canada 2023 establishments in Alberta League1 Alberta

History

Teams

See also

References