So, from a city of c.138,000 inhabitants to a city of c.4 million urbanites, Montreal is the second largest French speaking city in the world (after Paris) and it really is a bit of a shock to the system after a week in sleepy but friendly Moncton.
Similarly, the enormous leap in terms of the size of the arena from Moncton’s stadium with its temporary stands, to the almost cavernous Olympic Stadium (with its enclosed roof) which has a 66,000 capacity for a soccer game, is something that the players also had to adjust to.
I attended the Canada v Netherlands game on Monday night and the volume generated by the 45,000 supporters was impressively loud, especially with the slightly higher pitch of a women’s football crowd giving it that more piercing quality! The Canadian hardcore supporters ‘The Voyaguers’ were in good voice and bounced and chanted all the way through, plus there were pockets of Oranje fans giving it some ‘hop’ping too. Great stuff for the neutral. Canada’s coach John Herdman said it was a dream for his players to experience this kind of support, so I felt a bit bad afterpunching the air when Van der Ven levelled late on – they’d deserved it. Still, Canada did complete their aim to win the group and are delighted to be heading back to their long term training base in Vancouver. You’ll have heard this before but it’s important that the host nation progresses into the knockout rounds. They started well against the Dutch but they’ll have to play better and more consistently for 90 minutes, to go further. And if, and this is a very big ‘if’, both Canada and England win their next game, there’ll be an almighty quarter-final for us to look forward to!
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