Thank you very much.
I am Peter Montopoli. I am the general secretary for the Canadian Soccer Association. It's a pleasure to be here, and thank you for having me here representing the sport with the largest number of participants in the country. I think many of you are aware of that. We see that every day and every evening, whether it be during the day or on weekends, when the parks, the communities, and the fields are being used to the max for our sport. We are proud to be the sport with the largest number of participants in our country, with 850,000 participants, and also very proud that 42% of our participants are female; that's 355,000 participants.
In terms of the global perspective and the number of female participants we have competing, we're third in the world behind the United States and Germany. I think it's a strong tribute to the sport, the people in the sport, and the communities that we have extensive participation by both males and females at the grassroots level: 44% of all youth play the sport of soccer in their community.
As you can see, from a participation point of view this sport is fully entrenched in communities across the country. I've been asked to speak here more in terms of the Olympics, but I can go on and on about many things about our sport. I'd love to on another day, but we will stick to the agenda: the women's national team program that has qualified for the summer Olympics for the second consecutive time, this time for 2012. Part of that success, and maybe part of the Canadian Soccer Association's, is that our communities are growing the sport, but a large part is due to the Government of Canada, through Sport Canada, through “Own the Podium”, in funding our elite team, our elite program, to be one of the best in the world. Certainly there is no lack of funding for this program, which has now reached one of the highest levels in the world.
We are currently ranked number seven in the world, but we have just come off winning the 2011 Pan American Games gold medal, a first for women's soccer for our country in the Pan American Games. Arguably we probably have at this point the best women's player in the world in Christine Sinclair. I think all of you have heard of her, seen her, and we're very excited about her participation in the summer Olympics. This past week we held a match in Moncton versus China. She scored on the last play of the match, in the last seconds of the match, for us to earn a victory over China, and now has positioned herself as the third-highest-scoring female in the history of international soccer, behind only two who are at the highest levels. We expect that when she has completed her career, which we hope has many more years to go, she will be the highest-scoring female in the history of women's soccer. I think that's quite a tribute, not only to her and the community where she grew up, but to our national team program. All of us as Canadians can be very proud of her success. She was a flag-bearer for Canada at the Pan American Games.
We introduced a new head coach to the program in September of 2011. He energized the program. He brought new beliefs, new tactics, and a new foundation of support for that program, which needed it at that point, so much so that we really believe that with the program he's devised and the commitment of the athletes we can win Canada's first team medal for a sport in the summer Olympics since 1936. That's our goal this summer, to be the team that wins that medal for Canada as a team in the summer Olympics for the first time since 1936. This is what he has instilled in the players. I was with the players this past weekend, and they still believe that; they see that.
The competition schedule we put together for them is second to none. We played the United States, and we'll play the United States once again, on June 30 in the United States. We've played Brazil, Sweden, France, all top-four clubs in the world, and competed very well. We've had some draws, lost one match, and beat the others. We are competing at the highest level possible in order to be successful as a country. As we enter the Olympic Games, we know we are the first competition. We start two days before the opening ceremonies. The sport of football takes a long time to complete at the Olympics.
We've seen it happen before, where a team that is successful and goes very far can actually take the country by storm and know that for two and a half weeks the country is following this one team. We believe we have the players and we have the coach to be successful and to reach the pinnacle of international success at the Olympic Games.
The team is currently training in Vancouver, as a residency program. They will be training in Europe prior to the Olympic Games to do everything they and we can do as a country to be successful.
I'd like to thank the government for their support, not only of the team and of the Canadian Soccer Association, but also in 2012, when we hosted the CONCACAF women's Olympic qualification tournament in Vancouver. The government supported us through the hosting program and we were able to fill the stadium, B.C. Place--160,000 spectators throughout the course of the tournament, 25,000 sell-out lower-bowl playing a championship match against the United States that was televised nationally. We need to be doing more and more of that. That's why on the heels of that success and the success of our women's team we bid for the FIFA Women's World Cup 2015, through the support of the federal government. We secured that bid in March of 2011, and now we are beginning to work on that competition.
We were pleased two weeks ago to be here in Parliament, in front of the Canada doors, with FIFA president Blatter and the Minister of State for Sport, to announce the official host cities for 2015 of Vancouver, Edmonton, Winnipeg, Ottawa, Montreal, and Moncton. For the first time in our country--and I think this is one thing we really try to resonate in every speech we make--there is a major international competition that will be held coast to coast, from west coast to east coast and back, at the same time. It has never happened before in our country. It will never happen again. It's six provinces, six cities, at the same time. That's how a FIFA competition is held.
We are very excited at the prospect that every Canadian can touch and feel our sport, the women's FIFA World Cup, which is FIFA's second-largest competition. And it is the largest women's event of any kind in the world of any major sports, entertainment, arts, whatever you name--it's the largest. We have a lot of good things going on in the sport, but certainly without the support of the federal government it would be very, very difficult to achieve the goals and objectives we have set out.
We thank you for believing in the sport. We are the number one participation sport. We hope to continue to grow. We do need more fields. We'd like to work with the government on that, but at this point in time we believe our growth is at the highest level within our country, and our success is right on the edge of reaching that highest level of medals at the summer Olympic Games.
I'd like to thank the government, Sport Canada, and Own the Podium for your contributions, and for the opportunity to speak here today.
Thank you.