'The level is going up': International players attest to growth of Canadian Premier League

When João Morelli left his native Brazil as an 18-year-old to sign with English club Middlesbrough back in 2015, men's soccer in Canada was in a much different place.

Internationally, qualifying to a World Cup seemed like a remote dream to a team that was pretty much irrelevant on the global stage.

Domestically, the lack of a professional league meant a more difficult path for homegrown players to evolve, even harder for young talents to sign professional contracts, and impossible for fans to enjoy all-Canadian top-flight soccer.

Seven years later, the landscape has changed.

Not only has Canada secured one of the 31 berths for the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar through a stellar CONCACAF-leading campaign, but the Canadian Premier League (CPL) has filled the club-level void since concluding its inaugural season in 2019.

That hasn't gone unnoticed to international players in the CPL.

For Morelli — who joined CPL's HFX Wanderers in 2020 and claimed MVP and top goal scorer honours the following season — the future is bright for the four-year-old league.

"I've said this before: In five [to] 10 years, I think Canada will [reach the] level [of] the MLS, easily," he told CBC Sports from his hometown of Itu, Brazil, where he recovers from a torn ACL sustained early in the 2022 CPL season.

89’ <a href="https://twitter.com/atletiOttawa?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@atletiOttawa</a> 1-2 <a href="https://twitter.com/HFXWanderersFC?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@HFXWanderersFC</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/Jmorelli_96?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@Jmorelli_96</a> AGAIN. Is that enough to give HFX the win?<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/CanPL?src=hash&amp;ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#CanPL</a> l