ROUSING SEND-OFF
AS 40-YEAR-OLD SOCCER STAR
Christine Sinclair (below) walked off the pitch for the final time of her glorious international career in December, she received a thunderous ovation from a full house at Vancouver’s B.C. Place. That a women’s soccer game played in Canada could sell out a large stadium and deliver a national TV audience would have seemed unthinkable 23 years ago, when the Burnaby, B.C., soccer phenom first donned the Maple Leaf, at the age of 16. Back in the early 2000s, the women’s team played in front of sparse crowds, with limited media coverage and laughable compensation – Sinclair and her teammates earned $10 a day. Moreover, the prize money from global competitions paled in comparison to men’s and there was no domestic professional league from which they could earn a living. But in the late ’90s/ early 2000s, a perfect storm was about to hit the world of sports: the Women’s National Basketball Association tipped
off its inaugural season; Serena Williams began smashing her way to the top of the tennis rankings with stunning physicality; the fierce rivalry between the Canada and U.S. women’s hockey teams was born, with players like Hayley Wickenheiser and MariePhilip Poulin emerging as national heroes; and soccer stars Sinclair and the U.S.’s Mia Hamm started unfurling their epic feats. Women’s sports had entered the national conversation and for the first time, new professional leagues backed by big corporate dollars began to take root. This year, the Professional Women’s Hockey League will hit the ice with three Canadian teams and in 2025, a women’s pro soccer league will kick off its inaugural season. The latter, which would not be possible without Sinclair’s onfield brilliance or off-field influence, serves as a fitting legacy of the soccer great. As she wrote in a public letter to her 16-yearold self before her final international game: “While people will know you for your accomplishments on the pitch, they will remember you for how you transcended the painted white lines.”