For a city hosting the first FIFA World Cup match ever played on Canadian soil, Toronto looked remarkably Bosnian on Friday morning.
Supporters of Bosnia and Herzegovina flooded the downtown streets in a sea of blue and yellow, and while Calgarian Craig MacTavish is used to away supporters outnumbering Canadians at most Toronto soccer games, he was a bit surprised while walking to Toronto stadium.
“I am deeply concerned, the entire downtown area here is full of Bosnians,” he said with a laugh. “They say there’s about 30,000 of them here, and there’s no Canadian shirts around, so it’s going to be a very interesting day in the stadium.”
Interesting might be an understatement. Friday is a milestone decades in the making for Canadian soccer supporters such as MacTavish. He has spent over 25 years following Canada’s men’s national team, dating back to the team’s Gold Cup win in 2000, the top international tournament in North America.
Since then, he has travelled extensively to support Canada, including to Qatar in 2022 to watch Canada’s first appearance in the World Cup since 1986, when MacTavish was two years old.
Optimism for the team’s chances
For MacTavish, the excitement surrounding this World Cup is about much more than the home soil advantage. He said he’s optimistic about the team’s chances as the quality of their playing has greatly improved over the last four years, with more experience under the team’s belts and more players hitting their prime.
“In Qatar, it was like ‘can we get a goal? Can we maybe get a result?’,” he said. “And now this time it’s like ‘can we get many goals? Can we get wins? Can we make it out of the group?’ Expectations have changed a lot.”
MacTavish will be singing and chanting alongside other members of the Voyageurs supporters group, which he’s been a member of for 20 years, at all three Canada games during the group stage. He carefully planned his summer vacation plans back in November, securing his flights before the summer boom and carefully selecting his days off. He’ll be jetting back to Calgary in between matches to catch up on work, allowing him to fully embrace these historic matches.
Looking ahead
He doesn’t plan to follow the team to the USA in the ensuing rounds, but if they win his group he said he’d definitely be going back to Vancouver. But while the results remain unknown, MacTavish is crossing his fingers that the tournament’s impact reaches far beyond the scoreboard.
“I’m just excited to hopefully see a lot of people that aren’t necessarily normally soccer fans, going to watch soccer and hopefully enjoying it,” he said. “I hope it becomes popular so we get some better infrastructure, so the Calgary Wild can maybe not play in McMahon. I’m hoping for a lot of different things.”
