How Canadian Soccer Properties Are Leveraging World Cup Equity to Grow Their Fanbases
Author - Kushaal Mathew and Norm O’Reilly
With less than a month to go before the big show arrives, you can feel it. Soccer ads are flooding your broadcasts and socials, city streets are draped in World Cup 2026 branding, and retail aisles have gone full soccer. Podcasts are everywhere and media attention is rising every day.
In our world, sponsors are activating and brands without official rights are mitigating against their competitors’ activities. In our view, it is going to be one of the most active sponsorship settings – a lab if you will – that we’ve ever seen.
And it is going to be big! Thirteen matches across Toronto and Vancouver. Five billion viewers worldwide. This summer, the planet's attention passes through Canada, as a key part of a North American wide host.
TL;DR
The 2026 World Cup is an exceptional long-term opportunity for Canadian soccer, not a 30-day campaign window
YouGov data shows CPL interest has nearly doubled, and MLS interest has grown 80 per cent over the past two years — before the World Cup has even started.
The 1994 US World Cup is the clearest historical precedent, triggering the founding of the MLS, turning around a near-bankrupt federation, and building a healthy franchise ecosystem over 30 years
Canadian Soccer properties – TFC, CPL, NSL, and Canada Soccer Association are each activating differently
A Once-in-a-Generation Sponsorship Window
Already the largest participation sport in Canada, soccer is poised to add hundreds of thousands of new soccer fans in the span of six weeks. This is part of the sports ongoing growth from MLS to NSL to CPL and so much more. Just like the 1994 World Cup signaled soccer finally being relevant in the United States, we believe the same is the case for 2026 and Canada.
But let’s focus on sponsorship for a moment.
The question properties and agencies should be asking is not just about how we reach them during the tournament. It is how do we keep brands engaged after the World Cup final has been played?
This is the role of activation, T1’s speciality. We need to not only leverage the World Cup, but assess the effectiveness of our activations, evaluate the impact that ambush marketing efforts — which we know will happen — will have on sponsorship and provide evidence of activations that work. Yes, we can learn about what allows brands to reach soccer followers, participants and fans alike.
The Audiences Are Already Here – And Growing
The data (see chart below) from YouGov shows that CPL fan interest has nearly doubled between 2024 and 2026, and MLS interest in Canada has grown by 80 per cent over the same 2-year period. According to YouGov, both are still rising.
YouGov Profiles May 2024-May 2026: MLS Interest, CPL Interest, SportsIndex: CPL
As an example, according to YouGov, CPL interest, quality perception, and consideration have all grown sharply and consistently. ‘The Icicle Kick’ moment (David Rodriguez’s viral bicycle kick in the 2025 snowstorm CPL final) played its role, putting the CPL on millions of soccer fans’ social feeds
The World Cup will advance fan development at a scale never seen before in Canada. More than 600,000 soccer fans will crowd the streets of Vancouver and Toronto. Not to mention the millions who will watch or stream. Canada should have millions of new casual soccer converts by mid-July.
History offers a useful lens here. The 1994 US World Cup produced the highest attendance to date and triggered the founding of the MLS, which launched two years later, as a precondition of the hosting bid itself. Before the tournament, the US Soccer Federation was near bankrupt. Thirty years later, MLS franchises are now valued at an average of about US$760 million according to Sportico’s valuations.
Deep-Dive: Four Mini-Cases about How Properties are Activating the 2026 World Cup
Toronto FC and Living Legends Make the Most of The Upgraded Stadium
Courtesy: Living Legends
On May 8th, the global soccer event platform, Living Legends, hosted a Toronto FC Legends versus Brazil Legends match. Living Legends activated well beyond the pitch, as Ronaldinho made an appearance at Sumaq Iraqi Charcoal Grill creating content that went viral across the GTA. In-venue, their partners were integrated throughout, with interactive activations and signage included alongside TFC’s existing inventory at BMO Field, generating meaningful value for both sets of partners. The following day Inter Miami played Toronto FC in an MLS game in front of a record 44,828 fans - the largest crowd in club history. Both events were timed deliberately to break in the temporarily expanded stadium and generate revenue and market buzz ahead of the World Cup.
CPL Innovating and Repositioning as Canada's League
The CPL entered its eighth season and has been rebranding as Canada’s league. The league's visual identity has shifted from blue and green to Canadian red. They have secured expanded linear broadcast deals, and have introduced a first-of-its-kind FIFA rule trial: the 'daylight' offside rule, which calls a player offside only if there is a visible gap between them and the last defender, making the CPL the first professional league in the world to pilot it.
“When the World Cup comes and goes, we believe the vehicle to continue to drive the interest in the sport will be the CPL”
During the World Cup, CPL and its partners will be participating in campaigns and events tied to Canada Soccer. Most recently, the CPL and Canada Soccer jointly launched the CPL Cheers Canada "Red and White Out" series. The series includes eight coordinated matches across the country from May 29 through June 26, encouraging fans to wear red in the stands. Brands will be integrated through giveaways, co-branded digital content, and match-day activations across CPL channels.
NSL’s Coca Cola Deal Puts Them in Front of Pre-Built Audiences
NSL’s second season started in April and runs through the World Cup till mid-November with an expanded 80-match schedule. The league’s brand partnerships include Coca-Cola who signed on as NSL’s Official Soft Drink Partner before the NSL made a name for itself, committing Powerade and Smartwater as official hydration partners across all six clubs. Coca-Cola received prominent national broadcast placement, in-stadium branding at every venue, a season-long digital campaign celebrating goals of the week, and to top it off an exclusive promotion giving fans the chance to win a VIP trip to the inaugural NSL Finals. As an official FIFA partner, Coca-Cola will be activating throughout the World Cup and the NSL has been invited to participate at select events, putting the league in front of soccer fans across the country.
Canada Soccer and Canadian Soccer Media & Entertainment (CSME) Building a New Commercial Engine
In February 2026, Canada Soccer restructured its commercial agreement with CSME to a revenue-share model running through 2037. The new model means Canada Soccer takes a percentage of whatever commercial revenue CSME generates. Canada Soccer CEO Kevin Blue described the new structure as "significantly more favourable" to the federation. In the months since the new agreement, CSME has closed over six sponsorship deals, including BMO, Michelob Ultra, Samsung, and Uber Eats. Each partner is activating through Canada Soccer House fan hubs, send-off matches, retail integration, and athlete-led content. Notably, Gatorade deepened its existing commitment by signing CANMNT winger Tajon Buchanan as a 2026 campaign athlete and distributing 50,000 products in-kind to youth soccer associations nationwide. Allstate, Canada Soccer’s longest standing partner, integrates beyond traditional activation by hosting The Allstate Soccer Show — Canada’s only consumer soccer trade show — on June 14th early in the World Cup schedule.
So What?
What does this all mean for sponsorship in Canada? The best thing industry professionals can do is watch, learn, track, and amplify what is happening. Watch what global brands do? What happens in sponsorship in the US, Mexico and Canada. There is no question this will be a major moment for soccer in Canada, but will it be for sponsorship of soccer in Canada?
Sources:
Canadian Premier League (CPL) Official Press Release: "CPL Cheers Canada: Canadian Premier League Launches Coast-To-Coast 'Red and White Out' Match Series Supporting Canada Soccer Men's National Team," May 25, 2026
Canada Soccer Pressroom: "Canada Soccer and Canadian Soccer Media and Entertainment Announce Renewed Partnership," February 13, 2026
Sportico: 2026 MLS Franchise Valuations, February 2026
YouGov Profiles: MLS Interest, CPL Interest, SportsIndex, May 2024 - 2026