Canada has only qualified for the World Cup once — in 1986. But, thanks to a bunch of players who had honed their skills in the Canadian Soccer League, a scrappy and determined national team got very close to making it to USA 1994. That represented the last time Canada got close to a World Cup. We wonder what would have happened to us if the first-division Canadian league would have survived...

Earlier this week, the Vancouver Whitecaps named Carl Valentine, a member of Canada’s 1986 World Cup squad, as the club’s official ambassador. Valentine was a member of the 1979 Whitecaps squad that won the NASL Soccer Bowl, defeating the Tampa Bay Rowdies at Giants Stadium, just a week after Vancouver stunned the heavily favoured New York Cosmos in the semifinal. “Valentine, at 21, the kind of young recruit NASL teams should be looking for—rather than the big-name, passe players they are forever signing—was continually showing thrust and speed,” wrote Sports Illustrated’s Clive Gammon about Valentine’s performance in the Soccer Bowl. As well, you can’t miss the fact that, on the Whitecaps website, right beside the logo, reads a simple statement: “Since 1974.” This a team that was forged in the NASL, and doesn’t talk about the league in embarrassed hushes.