The Northern Super League - Canada’s new professional women’s league
A preview for the inaugural season of the brand new professional women's football league starting in Canada this month known as the Northern Super League.
The opening game of the inaugural Northern Super League (NSL) season will mark a new era for women’s professional football in Canada when it starts today as Canada’s first professional women’s league begins.
The Canadian women’s national team have had success in the past, yet only until now do they have a league of their own to nurture their own talent rather than Canadian footballers needing to go abroad and improve their game that way.
It will give the opportunity to not just up-and-coming Canadian footballers in building a career for themselves in their home country, but it will also provide an avenue for established Canadian women’s footballers to play professionally for a club in their home country as well and grow the women’s game even more over there as well and build upon some of those past successes.
What is the Northern Super League?
The Northern Super League is a six-team league founded by former Canadian WNT international Diana Matheson who co-founded Project 8 Sports in June 2022 after she had presented a plan for women’s football in Canada in December 2021. The Project 8 group also included another Canadian international legend in Christine Sinclair as an advisor. It should be mentioned that the Project 8 is recognised as a ‘league in membership’ by the Canadian Soccer Association.
The six teams who are founding clubs involved in this season are the Calgary Wild, Halifax Tides, Montréal Roses, Ottawa Rapid, AFC Toronto and finally Vancouver Rise.
The opening league fixture is on Wednesday 16th April for UK viewers if you wish to stay up to three am in the early hours of the morning with Vancouver Rise and Calgary Wild having the honour of playing the first-ever NSL game.
The way it will work is all six teams will play 25 regular season games which will finish by the middle of October this year with all the teams having played 13 games at home and 12 games away from home. By the end of the regular season, the top four clubs in the league table will compete in the playoffs.
The playoffs will be two-legged semi-finals both home and away with the higher-seeded team being the hosts for the second leg. The two teams then in the final will contest with each other to be the first-ever NSL champions later in November.
According to the NSL, there are 132 players that are signed to the six teams in the league. To break it all down, 87 of them are Canadians and the 45 others are from countries Australia, England, France, Germany, Spain and the United States are just a couple of the countries with players involved this season. 40 of them have also represented their countries at international level with a total of 1,120 caps combined.
Teams are allowed a maximum of eight internationals with NWSL clubs working within a $1.6 million salary cap, which covers a minimum of 20 players and a maximum number of 25 players and two of them have to be goalkeepers. One player in the squad is allowed to be designated as someone whose salary does not fit into that salary cap.
Players to Watch
Here are a few players from all six teams to keep an eye on for this season, some of which are known internationals including a couple of Canadians, one of which is Quinn who will be playing for Vancouver Rise after signing from NWSL side Seattle Reign. She is a veteran in the Canada women’s national team at this point of her career with over 100 caps and a gold medal to their name. Expect Quinn to be one of the faces of the league.
Emma Regan has been featuring a bit more for the Canada national team since Casey Stoney took charge and she is at AFC Toronto. She is a player who has been praised for her work ethic and versatility something which she showed at her last club HB Køge.
Recently retired internationals Desiree Scott and Erin McLeod are also signed to clubs in the league, Ottawa Rapid and Halifax Tides respectively to be exact.
From recently-retired international players to one for the future, Kaylee Hunter has been making a name for herself at youth level for Canada scoring eight goals and grabbing six assists in just six games with the U17s in 2023. She then scored seven as Canada qualified for the U20s CONCACAF Women’s Championship. Her contract with AFC Toronto is her first professional contract so she is an example of up-and-coming Canadian talent being able to grow their game now in their home country.
Montréal Roses have a once-standout performer at the US college level in their squad in Noémi Paquin. The attacking midfielder/forward managed 15 goals and four assists in 20 games, winning many accolades including Conference USA Player of the Year and Offensive Player of the Year, plus two championship trophies while at Florida International University. It’s her first professional contract too and she might be another one to watch.
Away from Canadian talents now, let’s look into some other international players starting with Meggie Doughtery Howard who spent eight seasons in the NWSL with clubs such as Washington Spirit, Orlando Pride, San Diego Wave (who she won the NWSL shield with in 2023) and Angel City, which was her last club in the US. She will be playing for the Calgary Wild and could be a good bit of business for them in their midfield options.
Another NWSL player Milly Clegg joined Halifax Tides on loan from Racing Louisville and she is a proven goal scorer too despite still being at a young age. The 19-year-old was in the New Zealand World Cup squad in 2023 and could use this experience in the NSL this year to work on her game and continue her development.
One last player to mention is 28-year-old Swede Ellen Gibson who left Hammarby last year after spending all of her senior career at the Swedish club where she was considered a bit of a club icon and praised for her consistency and leadership with the team as they won a league title in 2023 and competed in the UEFA Women’s Champions League. At youth level, she was very highly regarded and might just prove to be a good signing for Ottawa Rapid given her versatility as a defensive player and midfielder.
Head coaches profiles
Lydia Bedford - Calgary Wild
The English coach has had a very interesting career path and now she is in charge of the Calgary Wild for the first NSL season after experience managing in the WSL with Leicester City in the last few years. She was most recently at Brentford in the Premier League where she was their U18s head coach - the first woman to hold a coaching position at a men’s team there and she had some success too as they won the Merit League 2 in what was the team’s debut year.
She has also been an assistant to current San Diego Wave head coach Jonas Eidevall when he was Arsenal manager back in the 2022/23 season and for Calgary, Bedford being brought in feels like a bit of a coup given she is regarded well for her ‘tactical brilliance and player development expertise’.
Lewis Page - Halifax Tides
The Canadian is taking charge of Halifax Tides in this debut season and it just so happens to be his first coaching role after spending 25 seasons with the University of Prince Edward Islands Panthers having been the coach of both the men’s and women’s teams.
It’s a new chapter for Lewis Page and one where he will have to establish a new club and build something from the ground up. He has described himself as an adaptable coach but in an ideal world, he would want a high-press team that wants to keep possession of the ball.
Robert Rositoiu - Montréal Roses
From Romania, Montréal’s head coach Robert Rositoiu is someone with good experience and a track record of success in semi-professional leagues with Ligue1 Quebec side AS Blainville where he won three trophies; a League1 Canada Inter-Provincial Championship and two League1 Quebec titles.
He will hope to bring that success from the semi-professional level to the next stage, and those at the club have praised him regarding his knowledge of local talent pools and his playing principles, which could give him the ability to lay down a foundation and maybe produce success with his team.
Katrine Pedersen - Ottawa Rapid FC
Pedersen is taking on only her second head coach role after being an assistant coach for the Denmark women’s national team for six years between 2015 and 2021. She was head coach for a year at AGF Fodbold in the Danish Women’s League from 2021 to 2022. In recent years, she has been in a talent development role with the Danish FA.
She’s most known for her playing career, during which she is the record caps holder for Denmark with 210 caps. She was captain for ten years and was named Danish Women’s Player of the Year three times. She also made appearances at three World Cups and five European Championships. She is also only one of four Danish female coaches to have a UEFA Pro Coaching License.
Marko Milanovic - AFC Toronto
Milanovic has over a decade of experience coaching, including as head coach of the North Toronto Nitros men’s team in the League1 Ontario Premier Division and worked alongside another head coach Filip Prostran coaching TMU Bold. In his time at North Toronto, he had worked under a program that helped out many players who went on to play professionally and represent Canada internationally, one of which was Liverpool’s Olivia Smith.
AFC Toronto’s sporting director Billy Wilson had spoken about appointing Milanovic saying that his instincts as a leader combined with the passion he has for the sport having the potential to help drive the team towards success. It has been a few years since Milanovic has coached a women’s team which was back in 2019 as head coach of DeRo United in the League1 Ontario women’s division.
Anja Heiner-Møller - Vancouver Rise
Another Danish head coach takes charge of one of the teams in this league for the first season as Anja Heiner Møller will be coaching Vancouver Rise. The ex-head coach of Denmark’s women’s national U19s side is a UEFA Pro licensed coach and has mainly been head coach of other youth teams with clubs such as FC Nordsjælland (U18s) & Brøndby IF (U18s).
She does have history in Vancouver as well where she spent three years from 2018 to 2020 working as an academy coach at Vancouver Whitecaps and North Shore Girls Soccer Club. She also came up against a former Denmark teammate of hers Katrine Pedersen as Heiner-Møller and her played together at the 2001 Women’s Euros.
